And not just any Monday, but one that had the potential to hold news about small white things that go in your mouth and help with things like talking, eating and generally living.

Yes.

Teeth.

After weeks (months overall!!! 7 in fact!) of waiting and chasing, I finally got the call I had been waiting for: a referral to the seemingly elusive teeth man.

Let me try to explain the things riding on this appointment.

Firstly I was hopeful to find a timeline and course of action for teeth and hopefully get some information about the process because I have less than no understanding what happens or how it works. In fact the only things I know about it were from a chat with the CFO at work who seemed to have some very basic knowledge about implants.

I went in and had an x-ray first before seeing the teeth man. The machine played a strange digital rendition of Fur Elise by Beethoven. Which coincidentally is also the sound my doorbell makes. I tried to stay still and not giggle.

The waiting room was fancy. This place was fancy. The dental nurses wear white and the dentists blue.

My dentist Dr Dawood is my new best friend (yes I’m well aware I’ve got a few of them now). He was so nice, really easy to talk to, and also realistic. He looked at my teeth and asked if I ate a lot of fruit. Um… Not particularly… Then he asked if I’m vegetarian. No… Then he said ‘how have you been surviving?!’ I said brilliantly! I munch on everything!

So, we start on Wednesday (omgomgomgomg), taking moulds first. They will get the ones that Deepti took before surgery and make my new teeth just like my old ones! Cooooool.

First they will look at making a denture and see how it fits (if it even fits after everything that has changed in there) and then later consider implants.

Until we start trying we don’t know if it will work. If it doesn’t work, it’ll be back to my surgical team and back into surgery to look into more reconstruction from another body part. Yay for being plunged back into March.

Also there’s a good chance my lip won’t be able to fit over teeth anymore, especially with my sunken face, collapsed nose and the scar tissue from the stitches. So there might be issues there with actually fitting teeth in my mouth. And even if I can get the teeth in, they won’t fix these things so I’ll always look a bit odd. Better get used to being told by new people I meet that I have a cleft palate… Eye roll

But still, teeth is better than no teeth. And we’re aiming to have something temporary by the end of November! GUESS WHAT THAT WOULD BE IN TIME FOR?!! BIRTHDAYBIRTHDAYBIRTHDAYBIRTHDAY!

I was bouncing around manically and smiling rather widely as we booked in appointments over the next month or so. The receptionist who booked me in was lovely but I had to laugh. She asked me if I’d had an accident and I said no, cancer, and they cut my jaw out and now I’m just waiting for teeth.

‘Oh so your mum or dad has it too?’ She asked.

‘No, there’s no genetic link for bone cancer’ I replied.

‘And you didn’t smoke or anything?’

‘Lol no…’

The old what-did-you-do-to-cause-it-so-I-can-check-I-won’t-get-it job. Sorry love, you’re just as likely to get cancer as I was. Most cancers don’t have a genetic, environmental or lifestyle cause, we didn’t do anything wrong to bring it on ourselves…