I smell change...

Well my friends, I’m taking the plunge. After 14 years of frustration, I have decided to get my nose all prettied up & fixed.
About 9 months ago I started noticing an increase in trouble breathing, especially at night, and overall soreness in my nose. Over the past few years the skin on the bridge of my nose has started to feel paper thin and after months and months of contemplation I finally decided to visit an ENT (Ear, Nose, and Throat) doctor for an evaluation. I was very nervous and made Jeff go with me. Before the evaluation started the doctor said "Your nose is crooked and your face isn’t symmetrical, have you ever had any trauma involving your nose?" (nice guy eh?) I let the doctor know that I have broken my nose twice, but besides having very frequent sinus infections my entire life that is all that I can regard as a possible cause for the pain and trouble breathing.
The doctor-- who was wearing an old school doctor's headband with a light bulb on it, that blinded me every time he looked towards me-- stuck a cold metal cone up my nostril and said “hum…oh…humm” –(note to anyone in med school or aspiring to be a doctor- don’t do this- it scares people, gesh) He then informed me that not only is my septum completely sideways in my nose, but I also have large 'polyp-like' cysts up in my sinus and he needs to send me over to the hospital to get a CAT scan, to get a better look at the polyps. Awesome- at this point I wanted to run away- luckily Jeff was there to make me laugh and keep me calm. So the next day Jeff & I went to the Radiology dept at St. Raphael Hospital to get my CAT scan. The radiologist tech was super nice and let me know that I did indeed have a nice sized brain in there- (thank God, cause I was worried, ha). After about a week we went back to the ENT doctor and he let me know in super medical lingo that I indeed had large polyps that were blocking my airways and they had to come out- and he will have to re-build the sinus walls because they are diseased. Again, awesome, I have diseased sinus walls, sounds healthy.

On a positive note, two good things came from this news-
1. I get to have my surgery covered almost in full by insurance

2. I feel more at ease about doing the surgery, since I now know that if I don’t do it, there is chance that these polyps will get so big that I will no longer be able to breathe out of my nose-which is pretty important, right?

My third visit with my ENT doctor was the best, because I got to do a photo opt- and get a virtual simulation on what my new nose will look like. At first he made the ‘new nose’ look like a lil’ pug nose-which I DO NOT WANT. I also told him that I would like to not end up with a ski slope either! I must say now, that cosmetically speaking the appearance of my nose has always bothered me, but it was never enough to get me to fix it. I had the occasional tease from stupid boys in school- but I always told myself it’s what God gave me, and I would move on. So I had to let the doctor know that I want to look like me. I don’t want to come out of this looking like MJ, I really just want a mini-version of what I have now. So…here it is folks- the man who has met me 3 times has decided what I will look like (weird concept)

What do you think? At first I was like WHOA, way too small...then I realized that my 'large/small' ratio scale is off since I have always had a mile long snout. I took the picture home and stared at it for almost 4 hours- My #1 concern was what Jeff and my parents thought. Jeff loved it- but I think I could end up with one eye and Jeff would love me just the same. My mom said it looks like it did when I was little, before I broke it- and she got a bit teary because she is really the only person in this world that knows the heart ache that came from the teasing in school from other kids.

I know some may think it’s weird that I’m being so open about this- but frankly I really don’t care what people think. I just want to be open and honest with myself, my friends and family-thus the reason for the posting.
My surgery is next week- Thursday Sept 10th- and my wonderful mom is coming up to help Jeff take care of me. I’m so blessed to have such a supportive husband, family & friends and I love you all.
I will definitely be posting updates & pictures over the next few days on this bloggity blog, so stay tuned! Looking forward to breathing normal again!