My Surgery

I have always considered myself to be a generally healthy individual, but for many years, my main source of most bodily ailments were attributed to issues with my sinuses. Like clockwork every year, I would experience a round of the same symptoms and just go through the motions until everything usually resolved itself within a week or two.

Within the past year though, my sinus issues grew exponentially worse and lengthy infections always followed. Since last November, I have been prescribed Flonase nasal spray, Azithromycin on two separate occasions, Amoxicillin, Methylprednisolone, and Cefuroxime. None of them ever worked to alleviate or solve my problems. After so many infections and a most-likely built up resistance to certain meds, it was going to take something more to solve it.

This past March is when my most intense bout of sinus issues began and hardly ever let up, if at all. Since then I have battled daily headaches due to sinus pressure, constant post nasal drip, complete congestion of my nasal cavities, fatigue, and regular popping of the ears due to the inner cranial pressure. Combine that with one of the worst allergy seasons on record and these past 6 months have been absolute hell for me.

During the summer, I finally got my primary care physician to refer me to an ear, nose, and throat (ENT) specialist. It was there that I was diagnosed with chronic sinusitis, chronic maxillary sinusitis, chronic ethmoid sinusitis, a deviated septum, nasal polyps, and hypertrophy of the inferior nasal turbinates. After two subsequent CT scans of my sinus cavities, I consulted further with the ENT and agreed that surgery would be the next best, and logical step, having exhausted most medications and other routes.

Two weeks ago, I went in for my first ever surgery. I know there are more serious surgeries to have than one involving the sinuses, but since I have never had surgery before in my life, nor have I ever been in a hospital other than to visit someone else, this was a pretty big deal for me and a whole new experience.

The surgery involved general anesthesia and was performed endoscopically, which means they basically went up my nose with a camera, and other instruments, not requiring any external work to be done. Here is the rundown of the procedure in fancy medical terms: bilateral endoscopic sinus surgery with computer navigation, bilateral total endoscopic ethmoidectomy, bilateral endoscopic maxillary antrostomies, submucous resection of the nasal septum, and submucous resection of the inferior turbinates.

If you're really curious and have a strong stomach, you can watch this video and get a general idea of what this type of surgery entails.

After about an hour of surgery, I was sent into recovery for a few hours and was back home later that same day, under the care and watch of my loving parents. With a gauze bandage under my nose to soak up blood and packing plugging up both my nostrils, it was difficult to rest, eat, and breathe.

Surprisingly though, there wasn't much pain and no physical, external evidence of the surgery, such as bruising under the eyes or swelling. The majority of the time after surgery was just greatly uncomfortable and awkward. I had the packing removed the following day and continually walked around with gauze under my nose for the occasional bouts of bleeding, which mostly stopped by the 5th day. By then, most of the dark red blood and tar-thick mucus had begun to flow the other way, down my throat instead, resulting in me having to cough it up every hour or so.

A week after the surgery, I went back to the ENT to have dried blood chunks and mucus cleared out of my nose to promote healing and open the passageways. It was then that I was finally able to breathe again and feel relief. The healing process continues now with required irrigation of my nasal passages, at least twice a day, with a saline solution.

So, here I am now, in my second week of recovery, and am doing well. The surgery went smoothly, the healing is proceeding nicely, and I haven't been able to breathe this freely since the beginning of the year. So far, it looks as though everything was a success and I couldn't be happier.

The full healing process takes about 6-8 weeks, so I still have a ways to go. Every day though, things are improving. This surgery may be one of the best decisions I have ever made.