Advice from athletes

[mia137]

Hello.

I'm possibly getting a lefort 1 and maybe moving my bottom jaw back a bit on July 25th. I race mountain bikes and have a race August 25th. My orthodontist, who had the same surgery by the same surgeon, said he was playing tennis 3 weeks after his. Can anyone who has been through it tell me how realistic it is for me to race one month after surgery?

Also, I will obviously lose a lot of conditioning, especially because I'm going on a rafting trip for the 9 days before surgery, but I'm hoping I can get some easy training in during recovery by riding on an indoor training and doing some light strength training to keep my legs strong. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

Thanks!

[Hyrules]

Dangerous exercises and activities are not recommended for 6 weeks post-op. If you take a dive and hit your head you could end up in hospital with the same surgery again or worst. Recovery is not an easy thing. You will be exhausted for the first 2 to 4 weeks post op so training wont be an option and trust me the first 2 weeks you will be coping with the side effects of surgery.( aka drooling, clogged and bleeding nose, maybe pain and big tiredness) Since you are moving your bottom jaw you will be eating your food liquid so you will mostlikely lose weight and fast. I actually lost 10 pounds and guess what goes out first ? hint, it's not the fat. If you strain yourself from training you will not heal quicker and easier. Most of your energy will go to heal the bone. You will not get alot of energy from liquid diet and certainly not enough to go thru those kind of activities. Unfortunately I would avoid exercising post-op. The only real judge for this is you but you wont know until you actually get it done. I'm an actual p90x2 graduate. I`ve done the program twice and done p90x twice as well. (if you dont know the P90x programs they are not for everybody to take on off the bat) I might not be a football athlete or hockey athlete but i'm in shape compared to alot of people. Trust me I didn't had energy to do some workout.

First week you will be really tired you will have to sleep during the day to keep on going and straining wont help. Second week you might be able to last the whole day without sleeping but a nap here and there will be appreciated. You will still be tired. By the third week you will start to get better and will bei able to stay up all day long without being too tired. By the fourth week you will be able to go back to work with the idea that you have a not physically demanding job.

But hey ! that's my 2 cents. Others might tell you yes but that's different from person to person. Someone might heal quicker and you might take longer to heal.

[Vantwins]

I would say one month after is very unlikely, I'm sorry. I teach step aerobics. I started back just taking the classes maybe 5 weeks after. My jaw felt like it was bouncing around in my head - and that's with me doing the most low impact options. And really the problem is that it's so hard to eat, and you lose so much weight, you lack energy. And I'd get dizzy very easily. I could do weights alright standing up, but when I tried to do them laying back on a bench, I'd feel like I could pass out. You may be very lucky, but I wouldn't recommend putting a lot of money signing up for the race personally, it's really a long shot.
Vanessa

[Vantwins]

Oh, and I did SARPE by the way. I've got double jaw surgery in 6 months or so, and I'm just assuming I won't really leave the house for about a month!
Vanessa

[bmueller]

I think it's pretty unlikely. By week 4 I was back to work but I was walking slowly and very drained of energy. It is really tough to "drink" enough calories to even just do basic functions, let alone race or train. I would say by week 6 I had normal energy but it was still struggling to eat enough so I wasn't hungry.

Sometimes surgeons won't let you exercise for a given amount of time after surgery. They don't want you to elevate your heart rate and possibly cause bleeding or get into some accident scenario, fall and break your jaw again.

I do wish you the best in your recovery. If you do get to race, I certainly want to hear about it. I think that would be an epic recovery!

[BracketBaring]

I mountain bike too (along with enduro motorcycle riding/racing and road pedal biking), and my surgery (Lefort 1 and possibly BSSO) is scheduled for July 31st. When I told my surgeon I mountain bike, he said I should not do anything strenuous for the first few days after surgery, since my body will need to heal the surgical wounds and likely be exhausted from loosing blood during the surgery. It sounds like after a few days I can gradually return to working out if I feel up to it. However, I think it would be wise to avoid riding offroad for 6 weeks post-op so the bone can fuse first. While I rarely crash anymore, I think it would be catastrophic to face-plant only 4 weeks after surgery. I'll probably resume riding the road bike once I feel confident that I won't pass out while riding, lol. Hopefully that will be within 1 week, maybe 2. I'm supposed to return to work after 2 weeks, which I'm more worried about, since my job as a physical therapist involves talking all day, sometimes to elderly people who are practically deaf and refuse to wear hearing aids

[mia137]

Thanks guys! Bracket, we'll have to keep in touch and see how fast we both get back at it! I have my doctor appointment tomorrow to find out if we'll be keeping my tentative July 25th surgery date.

[BracketBaring]

Thanks guys! Bracket, we'll have to keep in touch and see how fast we both get back at it! I have my doctor appointment tomorrow to find out if we'll be keeping my tentative July 25th surgery date.

Will do!

[Hyrules]

I'm not the pessimistic kind of person and i'm someone who normally heal fast out of anything (my surgeon is even impressed) and trust me you wont be able to do anything 2 weeks after surgery and even less at the 1 week mark. You will be drained out of energy. When I say drained I say really really really drained. Really tired. Trust me if you think you are ready for this you are not. Think what you want you are not ready until you experience it and knows what it feel. Don't think drinking any kind of liquid diet will give you the energy you need to do any kind of workout. I was saying to myself hey ! 2 weeks after surgery I'm going to start working out slowly and go back to work but hahaha was I never close to doing this. I went back to work a month after surgery and started working out 6 weeks after surgery. And like someone else said in this thread, if you workout after surgery you will feel like your jaw is loose in your mouth. Not a pleasant feeling. Going back to work at 2 weeks is doable but if you have a talking job you will be having some problems. Depending on the surgeon you might have your jaw shut with rubber bands for weeks after surgery. Mine remove the rubber bands 1 week after surgery and the acrylic plate 2 weeks after surgery but that's different from surgeon to surgeon. Some wireshut for 6 weeks some for 4 some for 2. The best thing is to talk about it with your surgeon. You will have to relearn to talk after surgery. First week : forget about talking you are banded shut nothing is going out as voice beside groaning. Second week : you will start to talk but will have problem being understand because you will have an acrylic plate. Week three : you will get better at talking and might even lose the lisp you will get from the plate. At week four : you should have no problem talking. This was my timeline and this is assuming your surgeon removes the rubber band a week after surgery. I don't know about American surgeons but mine is one of the quickest to remove the bands i have seen on this forum. The more you force yourself doing workout the longer it will take to heal. Honestly take it slow. You won't regret doing this surgery but don't overdo it. Good luck with the surgery I hope it goes well for both of you and you are able to heal fast.

[mia137]

I went to the doctor today, had my surgery consultation with all the nifty 3-D images and stuff. He said he allows activity based on the person and his sense of their ability to gauge what they're ready for when. He said no exercise the first week but, barring any complications, I'll be doing light exercises week 2. We talked about the risks and what I need to look out for.

I'm not expecting anything, especially with regards to the race, but might as well stay optimistic!

[LyraM45]

I'm slated to have my jaws done in Jan or Feb 2014, which is right smack in the middle of my snowboard season. I didn't even bother buying a SPAM this year, which really broke my heart, but I'm figuring on not doing much for about 4-6 weeks after all of this is done. I'm starting to plan some backpacking trips for the summer of 2014, but I'm going so far as to not even schedule anything for the spring months just to give myself more time to get back to things.

Sucks not being involved in the stuff we love to do, but it will all be a drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things once we're back up and running!

[mia137]

@Bracket - How is your recovery going? I'm doing really well. I think my nutrition and rest has been very good. I've been spending some time on my indoor trainer since the weekend. Taking it super easy but it's nice to get my legs moving. I have a dr appt on Thursday so I'll talk to him about upping my indoor training a little. I've only lost 3-4 lbs and my swelling is almost completely gone. I think I just look like I had a bad collegen injection now, so living in LA, I fit in.

I'm in a lot of pain today and had to get back on pain killers (I was almost off yesterday and was planning on just taking Aleve today) but that seems to be from my braces as it's the gums on my lower teeth. My braces are super new so I'm not used to the movement and my husband said it sounds like I might have exposed some nerve but it'll probably fade on its own. I have a tentative appointment to see the doctor first thing tomorrow if it's still bothering me.

[BracketBaring]

@Bracket - How is your recovery going? I'm doing really well. I think my nutrition and rest has been very good. I've been spending some time on my indoor trainer since the weekend. Taking it super easy but it's nice to get my legs moving. I have a dr appt on Thursday so I'll talk to him about upping my indoor training a little. I've only lost 3-4 lbs and my swelling is almost completely gone. I think I just look like I had a bad collegen injection now, so living in LA, I fit in.

I'm in a lot of pain today and had to get back on pain killers (I was almost off yesterday and was planning on just taking Aleve today) but that seems to be from my braces as it's the gums on my lower teeth. My braces are super new so I'm not used to the movement and my husband said it sounds like I might have exposed some nerve but it'll probably fade on its own. I have a tentative appointment to see the doctor first thing tomorrow if it's still bothering me.

Hi Mia. I'm doing pretty well. Today is post-op day 6 for me. I had 2 doses of morphine the day of surgery and 2 doses of liquid roxicet the next day, but I have not used any pain meds since. Just on 300mg ibuprofen 2-4x/day, and 2 tsp liquid children's Sudafed and my antibiotic every 6 hours. Since I'm not on narcotics, I've been able to drive since the day I got home, which is very liberating. Energy levels have been relatively low for me, but I haven't had to take any naps since I got home. My surgeon said I lost a whole unit of blood during the operation because the anesthesiologist was too scared at first to lower my blood pressure to where he wanted it. Plus I had auto-donated a unit of blood 2 weeks before surgery, and another unit 2 weeks before that (so I've lost 3 units of blood in the past 5 weeks). My labs were not low enough to require a blood transfusion, even though I had my own blood there ready to go

Most days I was getting tired from just getting up so much to prepare food, and then attempting to eat from the syringe. I've been quickly discovering that a lot of stuff will not fit through that damn thing, no matter how much I mix and blend it. It's so frustrating that I can't just pick something up and put it in my mouth. I started counting calories yesterday morning and realized that I was not getting nearly enough. I'm 6'3" and was 202 lbs, which puts my basal metabolic rate (how many calories I would burn a day if I did absolutely no activity) at just over 2,000 calories per day. Today I weighed 193 lbs, so the weight has been coming off faster than I like. I bought some protein powder yesterday and have been adding a half scoop to each 8 oz shake I make. I've also been forcing myself to eat and drink more throughout the day.

Today was the first time I didn't feel weak or light-headed at all. I actually spend 3 hours today hand washing and waxing my car (first time all year, lol), and then walked the dogs, and still have energy to spare. I might try riding the road bike around tomorrow. The biggest factor limiting my activity though is actually the difficulty I have breathing from the congested airways and being banded shut at the mouth. It's steadily improving though, so we'll see how the next few days go. I see my surgeon in 2 days, and I'm hoping he'll wean me down to lighter elastics (he mentioned last week he might do this), and maybe even let me remove them some during the day to go through some self ROM exercises. He knows I'm a PT, so perhaps he'll give me some autonomy with the bands. I would still wear them though for exercise and sleeping at the very least.

My swelling had been coming down substantially each day since the surgery. My lips are almost back to normal now (they were like 3x larger right after surgery- ridiculous). Most of my swelling now is around the mandible and below my chin, giving me a double chin that I've never had before. I'm still numb though in the area beside my right nostril and my right upper lip, in addition to the whole bottom lip and chin. The bottom lip and chin numbness are caused from irritation of the inferior aveolar and mental nerves that are located very close to the mandibular fracture, and is expected with the BSSO surgery. Damn drool is annoying. On the plus side, I am able to smile without much discomfort

[mia137]

Good job on not using narcotics!! I have not been as good at that. I get very sleepy and cranky when I'm in pain so, while I really don't need any narcotics today, I have stuff I have to do so I took a half dose. The pain I was feeling yesterday was from an exposed nerve. The doctor told me to take a break from the elastics and showed me different teeth to put them. Since I took a pain killer anyway, I'm going to go put them on now. They said I'll feel some pain for about 10 to 12 hours so might as well sink 4 of those into the narcotics.

I've been using a fair amount of protein powder in veggie juices. I've also been lucky having someone cook awesome healthy food for me. I've only lost 3 lbs. It's noticeable on my frame, but I actually don't seem to have lost much muscle. I've been able to use a spoon since day 1, so I have it easier than you. Good luck getting more calories in.

I can smile now! It's a ridiculous smile but it's done wonders for my mood. I can finally laugh, too. That still hurts but it's worth it. My poor husband was so excited when I gave a little smile for the first time. I couldn't see it.

[JayC]

Tennis is very different than mountain biking. If it is a sport with any chance of collision or contact, I would wait a solid 2 months. It's not worth it. You can start doing light exercises after a couple of weeks, but don't risk contact sports anytime sooner than the 2 month mark, imo. From personal experience, I had BSSO and also sliding genio, and I went back to hockey too soon. Too an elbow to the chin and it loosened the screw on my chin. It was SCARY. My chin literally was "wiggling" as the screw was loosened. Luckily I didn't have to go back and get it re screwed as my surgeon said it would heal on its own and luckily it didn't effect the outcome of the procedure. So take it from someone who DID go back to sports too soon. Don't. I tried to get back about 3-4 weeks when I should have waited until the 8 week mark.