One year on...

1 year on…

About 4 1/2 months after my operation my voice finally started to stabilise. I found I could shout out if I needed to and I started to sound like my old self again. At my next ENT appointment my chords were filmed
‘in action’ The disappointing news was that my left chord was still pretty
immobile sitting across my larynx, but the good news was that my right chord
was growing stronger and compensating for the left one, and this was the reason
behind my improving voice. Not the news I wanted to hear but at least I could
talk again.

I returned to work in Oct 2009, 6 months after losing my voice. I had always worked part time with some of that from home, but my employers agreed to limit my time in the office to just one day a week to
remove the temptation to talk from me and from other work colleagues. A session
with an occupational therapist in February has confirmed that this is the right
approach and I am still following that work pattern. I do realise though that
if I ever had to change employers that things might not be so easy and that
does worry me at times, but I will cross that bridge when I get to it.

Today, I still have stamina issues with my voice, a day at work or socialising with friends can leave me sore and croaky, but if I use it moderately then my voice can sound normal and last all day. I still have issues
with my breathing and as I wasn’t thin to start with this is my biggest issue,
as it is even harder now to exercise, but I persevere.

My ENT consultant feels that my damaged nerve is unlikely to recover now, but on the other hand he also thinks that as it is still hanging in there and occasionally twitching after a year that the risk of atrophy is
getting smaller as well.

All in all I remain positive, my experiences over the last year have been enlightening and I know things could have been a lot worse, I tend to become conscious of how much I talk and I like to think that this has
improved the quality of what I say as I don’t just talk for the sake of it
(well not as much as I used to) and I do try to be concise (in theory anyway)
But I am a woman and a social one at that so I still get carried away and want
to talk about the weather, children and the price of bread just as much as the
next person J