I have had chronic, and I mean chronic ear infections my entire life. I had them so frequently as a child that they had to start looking up new antibiotics to give me. In 2003 I got another set of ear tubes, and for the most part that has kept me down to one or two ear infections a year.
Until last year.
I had six, count them, SIX ear infections in the ear that still has a tube in it, in only 5 months. After talking ear stuff with a coworker, she recommended I see an Otoneurologist whom she had seen. So I scheduled an appointment and after a CT scan, we discovered that some of the air cells in my mastoid bone were full of gunk.
The doctor said that would probably account for the increase in infections and told me we could do nothing, or we could do a mastoidectomy. I decided to go ahead with the mastoidectomy because why not if it could help.
Last Thursday I went in and had it done. They made an incision behind my ear and drilled into my mastoid bone to remove the yucky stuff. (For more on the procedure click here.)
The worse part about the surgery was getting the damn IV in. It took them longer to get it in than it did for the surgery. Only took 12 tries.
There was not much pain afterwards, just kind of like an earache. But the top of my ear is numb, yet itches. So annoying. And also, I can't blow my nose for three weeks. You never know how awful that is until you can't do it.
I came out of the surgery looking like Van Gogh, or maybe a pirate. There has been a lot of drainage but everything looks happy and healthy.
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