Your Stories

I wouldn't be concerned about it. Having recently had the same procedure, I can relate. It sounds like your surgeon pulled the inner lip tissue together to form a crease or fold in order to stitch up the incision properly. That's what's pulling your lip down and creating the gap. As it heels and the stitches come out, I'm sure it'll return to normal. The tissue is very resilient and will stretch back again. You might have some scar tissue there, but hopefully that will subside with time. Give it a week at least and then give your surgeon a call. No need to contact a plastic surgeon at this point. These guys do this all the time, and unless you got a bargain basement penny deal from a med school flunkie with a vengeance, I'm sure they knew what they were doing.

Be patient...


B

Thanks brainfry. I guess I am just being paranoid right now because I didn't get a chance to ask the doctor about it and I didn't see how I looked until I left the doctors. I wasnt expecting to look like I do.

Thanks for writing! It helped calm me down to know this is normal.

No worries... it's all good. Keep us posted.

And for the record, my lips are sometimes swelled in the morning (depending what I ate the night before) and sensitive to all sorts of stuff too... just part of the grand scheme, I guess...

Don't forget to rinse with warm salt water every few hours and relax... you'll be amazed how quickly lips heal... LOTS of blood flow in there, in a couple days you'll be nice and relieved.


B

2.5 days and I still have major swelling so I can't barely tell if it's symmetrical or not! What I do know is that I still have difficulty pronouncing certain sounds - F and V for example. I'm a lawyer and have a court appearance in about 10 hours - wish me luck!

Good luck! Im having more trouble with P and M. I had to repeat myself several times when ordering a "ilkshake".

...and I cant sing worth anything right now (Im in a chorus and a musical production right now).

So far it's been a week and I still have a numb area and my lip still has a major gap in it.


I'm seeing my doctor today. Maybe he will tell me the gap will puff out and look like the other side which is no longer swollen and still is much larger and shaplier than the side with the stiches...which, by the way, are almost all gone. Only two remain...loosely. I'm still worried that this is permanent and I'll need to see a facial reconstruction specialist. Otherwise my right side of my face will always look like I am snarling...


Kab,How did your court appearance go? I've regained use of my Ms and Ps but now I can't say my Fs and Vs without hissing. I sound like I have a lisp...and its all because there is STILL a gap in my lips on the surgery side of my mouth. The air is escaping through it oddly. I sing and act and do speeches/presentations for work on occasion. This is not acceptable.

I feel so sad.

here are my lips before surgery (my normal lips) yeah, they arent perfect lips or whatever, but they were mine:





This is one week after surgery. Do you all think my lip will really regain its shape? When my lips are closed there is always a gap unless I really press my lips together. I know its not THAT bad or horrific or anything, but it isnt my smile and Im upset. i find it hard to believe they will reform on thier own.:

Nice lips! ;)

I'd still say give it time... and by all means forward/bring your photo montage to your surgeon for discussion.

And it's only been a week, so try and be more patient... it's been over a month for me, and I still have
scarring on the inside and a hard ridge where the incision was...

Keep us posted.


B

I'm in your boat.

What did your plastic surgery visit yeild? Did they provide you any answers?

I'll give it time, but I'm going to have some other people look at it. The surgeon could have closed it differently (verticaly instead of horizontaly). My upper lip was literaly pulled into my mouth to close the wound. At least i am pretty sure the sensation is going to come back with time...I hope...and if the dip in my lip is permanent a plastic surgeon can fix it or so Ive heard. The actual scar itself is on the inside of my mouth and it is pretty bumpy right now.

Oh, and Ive decided I dont like my doctor. On my follow up I DID bring in my pictures but he acted all defencive and really didnt calm my fears or talk to me. Granted I was in tears and upset but I wasnt yelling at him or being rude. I just felt like they wanted to get me out of there asap instead of reassuring me. I suppose most doctors are not that compassionate but most of them tell you exactly whats going on and will let you know not to worry etc. He acted like he was clueless or guilty...


So...People are telling me I look like Rocky. lol!

Ouch - I can't believe your doctor acted that way!

Mine was smaller and the incision was vertical not horizontal. We had our surgery about the same time, so I'm in the same stage of recovery. The two main differences I see are that one, mine was a lot smaller, and two, mine was almost perfectly centered on my lip. My wife thinks it looks great now, but she's trying to make me feel better. It definitely still looks worse than the mucocele did. It is improving though, and rapidly. I had most of my stitches removed a couple of days ago, leaving one in the middle for more support. I also have internal dissolvable stitches. If you have those, they may account for part of your problem. In my lip, they are basically pulling the lip together from the inside, so I basically feel like my lip is pinched together. It's not that obvious to the eye though, because everything is right down the center line. I did get a few moles removed at the same time and have the same thing going on at each incision site - internal stitches that are pulling the whole area really tight from the inside. So I guess what I'm saying is, if you have those stitches, as they dissolve, your lip should fill out to its normal proportions.

If you don't, and that's the way it's going to stay, I'd say that your surgeon blew it big time. At least your scar is on the inside though - mine is right up front and all that bumpiness is pretty visible. Plus, I spend most of the day in court, talking of course, and every day when I get done it's dried out, sloughing dead skin, and kinda hurts. I've got an office day tomorrow though and then the weekend, so hopefully I can keep some vaseline on it and just let it heal...

Sorry for your difficulties! That doctor, even if he's not compassionate or sensitive or reassuring, should AT LEAST be telling you what's going on, why, and what you can expect in the future. I really hope you don't have to have another surgery - I wouldn't wish it on anyone twice!

Court is going well, but it dries out my lip and makes it hurt. =(

Sorry about your problems - it's one thing if it's strictly a medical issue, but if it's affecting work... I don't know how I would handle it if I couldn't do my job.

Well, I'm no doctor....but it seems really strange to have done a horizontal incision. I wonder if he did that to avoid causing a scar that showed externally. He may have thought he was doing you a favor by ensuring that the incision did not show on the exterior of your lip. In any case, it seems unusual to do the horizontal incision, and it also seems like it would be difficult to sew the area in such a way that it doesn't pull to the extent that it greatly reduces the "normal" size of that side of your lip. It just seems logically a lot more difficult to retain symmetry with a horizontal incision than with a vertical one.

I think it would be interesting to ask if anyone had a lower lip mucocele and had it removed with a horizontal incision. All the photos and descriptions I've seen on the internet have implied the incision was always vertical.

Well, I've had a mucocele for months.....and have kept up the draining thing....finally looking into having it removed permanently, and all of these horror stories have me pretty freaked out. Yet, the thing drives me nuts, and I want it removed, so I will probably go through with it.

BTW, I think the doctor didn't say anything because of the potential malpractice liability.....you're right that he probably felt guilty (how could he not?), and he was also probably worried since I would think you'd have grounds for a lawsuit.

Good luck to you. I'm sorry this happened - it sucks! But hang in there....one way or another, you'll get it fixed.

Kab, they were all dissolvable stitches and are all gone now. Or at least I assume they are all gone, I suppose some on the inside (if there are any) might still be hanging in if they exist. Its been nearly two weeks now and the stitches I could see, all five of them) fell out a week ago so I assume they are all gone by now. I don't feel any lumps in my lip where stitches might have been sewn. I'm going to have to get my medical records to see what exactly he did...to see if there are any internal stitches still holding my lip down. However, based on how much of my lip has healed and where the lip now meets the inner scar I really don't think its going to fill out.

Thank you for letting me know yours was sewn up vertically, which makes so much more sense to me. So, in all likelihood I probably could have had a vertical incision instead of the horizontal one, which wouldn't have involved the pulling down and in of my lip.

I hope your lip heals up quickly for you and stops irritating you so that it doesn't bother you at work.

Spumanti,

Thank you. And thank you for posting the poll.

I hate going through this, but I appreciate everyones support.

I really get the feeling my doctor didn't think about what he was doing. He said to me in the follow up meeting that he had never even seen a mucocele in this particular location before. Great. So basically he went in there without any experience dealing with a mucocele below the lower lip.

As for your own mucocele, do yourself the favor I wish I had known to worry about and search around for a doctor who's experienced, reputable, and going to make sure you come out looking the same as you did walking in.

Hang in there, Ackhelp. Lips are pliable things, so it could be that yours stretch back into place in time. Hmm....I do wonder why he did a horizontal incision, though. I hope you get somewhere by having another doc look at it. Good luck.

I think I might be getting some sensation back in my lip. I'm not really sure though, I could just be getting used to the numbness but I think there is now a little tinglyness.

My lip unfortunately still looks exactly the same and the plastic surgeons I've seen both tell me they are not optimistic about it looking any better on it's own. One of them wants me to keep massaging it and look at it again in two months.

But at least I might be getting nerve regrowth.

Good to hear, Ackhelp. I think it's good to wait and see, and I'm hearing that the massaging thing is good and that the lip will "re-model" in time. So, it's probably good to wait a year or so before making any decisions.

Six weeks since surgery, and I still have a numb area on the outside of my lip, although I think it's a bit better. My incision has formed a scar that still feels like a tight band. I notice it a lot and find myself pushing at it with my tongue all the time. My surgeon told me 3 mos until sensation returns and 1 year+ until scar and lumpy feeling go away.

One thing is certain....when I look at those pictures of the guy having the mucocele excision, which shows the scar 2 weeks out, it looks like nothing. While my mucocele was no bigger than his and probably showed even less, my excision looked way worse, was way deeper, and had a lot more stitches, and most stitches were still in place 2 weeks out. And even today, 6 weeks later, the scar shows way more than his did at 2 weeks. So, I think that series of photos is misleading. It looked like a piece of cake to me, after I saw those, but for me, the procedure was more involved....but maybe it just varies.

Recovery is an annoying, lengthy process.....and it would be nice if they could develop a less invasive procedure, such as the CO2 laser ablation or micro-marsupialization.

Yeah, his pictures do seem like a cakewalk.

The dip in my lip seems severe enough for all the doctors to think I will need to have a lip augmentation proceedure to fix it. There has been no change in the size of it.

I'm hoping the sensation is coming back, there are days when it seems to be completely numb and other days when I think there is a little feeling.