Hi Kyle, your surgery sounds identical to mine - including the partially numb left ear. My doc was surprised it was only one - as he told me in advance that would probably happen. I too avoided the feeding tube and the trach. Glad you came along well. Sorry to hear of the delays though.

It's funny - I can't really remember a whole lot about those first three days. I stayed in the hospital for 5 days total and didn't have anything including water by mouth for the first 3, so that could be the difference. In addition, I was pretty high on morphine most of those first few days - but I remember trying to eat the first time. It was quite painful.

Keep your hopes up. I thought I sounded horrible at first - but my voice is back to what others would think is 100%. I can still hear slight differences in some words and the way they feel when I speak them. I also had the trouble moving my tongue to eat. Once your swelling goes down - that will resolve a little more. It was really hard to eat some foods for probably a good month or two. But, overall, I thought it didn't take too long to get back to normal. I remember my doctor asking if I was still having trouble with mashed potatoes and I was already eating steak (albeight - very small pieces!). He couldn't believe how quickly I recovered. I have to credit the surgeon for most of that though as he really did a good job.

Sounds weird, but I remember one of the first solid foods that I could eat was macaroni and cheese. The homemade kind. I could eat "One noodle at a time" and I kind of just let it "slide" down real easy. This may or may not work for you and I definitely would be careful trying it as it probably wasn't my smartest move in the world - but my family was eating it and it smelled so good!

I lived on Ice Cream the first few weeks after surgery. Eating tons of ice cream and still losing weight!

Good luck with everything! I hope the rest of your recovery goes well.