From Debridement to Detox--and the Joke Continues

It's now six weeks since the debridement and the pain in my jaw has practically gone away--enough that I could cut off my pain meds entirely and start to deal with coming out of  four+ months of an opiate-induced haze.  I had started to wean myself off the Roxicet before my last post, but was advised to slow down on the rate of withdrawal as the detox symptoms got a bit too heavy, too fast.  So I waited until Terry and I would be by ourselves at the beach for two full weeks, and gave her the order to "Hide the sharp knives--I'm going to detox the rest of the way, and there's no telling what might happen."  Truth be told and thinking the worst, I had some idea that Terry might be the one using the knives, not me.  That was a week ago, and I'm happy to report that the detox symptoms were not as severe as I expected--some headaches, a bit of nausea, diarrhea, some insomnia (that's why God made Atavin), some anxiety, and some "restless leg" syndrome.  All of those things lasted 3-4 days and I feel like I'm through it.  And, the Roxicet bottle is no longer screaming my name in the middle of the night.  Now, if only the Jack Daniels bottle would shut up...

But the joke is still not over.  Next thing to deal with?  Very blurred vision from some unknown combination of aging, and--you guessed it--those freakin' hyperbaric treatments.  I don't know the definition of legal blindness, but every time Terry jumps up and says "There's dolphins swimming right off the beach--can you see them?" my reply is "Shit, I can't even see the beach, much less the dolphins."  Actually Terry didn't even need to hide the knives--I couldn't have found them if they were right in front of my face.

So, now the list of doctors is going from: family dentist, to oral surgeon1, to oral surgeon2, to ENT, to oncologist, to radiation oncologist, to gastroentronologist, to otorlayryngologist, to oral surgeon3, to a retinal opthamologist specialist who will try to figure out how much of my blurred vision is from natural aging and how much is from side effects from hyperbarics.

But, as always, this "new normal" of a life I have is far better than that "other" option I was facing, and it won't bother me in the least later tonight when I have to ask Terry, "Is that the moon, or Venus we're looking at?"   She'll smile at me and say, "Neither, Honey, that's a shrimp boat."