Slowly Moving away from the dreaded Syringe - Day 15 (May 23)

Today is the day that I plan on not using my 60ml syringe to feed myself. I have recently developed the skill of putting a cup to my mouth, tipping it back, and trying to gulp what I can, and let me say, I have taken drinking from a cup my whole life for granted. Now for one, I do not use a straw because they saw sucking from a straw can affect incisions in the mouth. I don't know when that rule ends but I am still following it.

Drinking is challenging for several reasons:

- My lips have very little feeling, especially my bottom lip.
- My lips are in a much new orientation that feels so different, being my top lip is now the first thing to touch the cup! If you see in my before op photos my bottom lip used to stick out, and therefore I could just stick my jaw out and drink, now it's weird when your top lip is out first. I finally understand a milk mustache! It happens everytime, even with soup. Riveting.
- I never know where I am pouring, I have poured milk straight onto my chin once and didn't feel it - until it hit my shirt!

All in all, it's a slow process once again, but I'm happy to be getting close to normal. This is what my meal table used to look like for the first 2 weeks:

Over the bathroom sink I would syringe from my apple juice, some boost, some water, and then from a cup to rinse out my syringe. Yuck. That was my daily feast. I am happy to now just drink over the sink with a magic bullet smoothie cup and hope it goes down smoothly. It's challenging but so much more normal looking.

I just want my calories back!