It's been about 4 months of Bell's Palsy and I want to put another update up here. The biggest thing I notice about my face that still hasn't cleared up is that I can't squeeze my right eye shut tight like I can my left. This bothers me a little bit, mostly when swimming without goggles on. When I laugh, I can't feel it, but the left side is a bit more squinty than the right. You can see it in this picture:
The past few weeks I have been feeling some twitchiness in the BP side, and a little tightness in the muscles. I am hoping this means more healing is taking place... I noticed when I close my mouth tight there is a lumpiness in my chin, I'm using muscles there that I never used before. I'm trying to remember to relax my chin when I close my mouth. My mouth is sometimes symmetrical and sometimes crooked. Both corners of the mouth work, but not always in unison. I think when I'm tired, the BP side doesn't cooperate as well. Here's what it looks like when crooked. (The BP side of the mouth is actually bigger here.)If I look in the mirror or concentrate on it, I have no problem making both sides look the same.
I haven't been doing facial exercises, and I think I should do them again for a few weeks and see if I can get to 100% recovery. All in all I am very happy with how things are going!
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