After a face transplant it would be somebody else's face. I fear something within me might recoil at the sight. Oh, I have no squeamishness about wearing another man's face after he has no need of it; I support transplants of all sorts, and when I die I hope my poor organs can be of use to someone. I wish happiness to the farmer in Spain, the woman in Ohio, and Steve Jobs with his new liver. I was tremendously moved to learn Robert Altman had lived for more than 10 years with a transplanted heart.
Think of the films he was able to make, the joy he was able to bring. All of that is good. If I should someday need a heart or liver, I will seek one. But this face, however imperfect, is still mine. I own it. I look out of it. I'm rather fond of it. For some time after taking that "final photo" of myself, I avoided looking in mirrors. I knew the first operation had gotten the cancer but the reconstruction had failed.
I vaguely knew what I must look like, but I didn't want to know. I was still inside, right here, in my head looking out, and in my mind I still had the same face. I could even feel sensations in places I no longer possessed--the "ghost limb" phenomenon. How did I know I'm in my head? How do any of us know? That's where my brain lives, and where my eyes sit.
I am not in my chest, my hand, or my foot. I live in here, and operate all the rest like Iron Man. And in here, I still imagine the same face, no matter what you see. Of course eventually I looked in mirrors, and grew to accept my new appearance.
After the first surgery it looked After the second surgery, Chaz said I looked pretty good. There was a vein running beneath my chin that carried a blood supply from one side of the jaw to the other.
The surgeon showed my nurses a simple way to listen to the vein. If it was thrumming, it was working. It thrummed for several days. I could listen. Then it thrummed no more. The transplant broke down and was removed. For the third surgery, I went to a famous man at a famous hospital in Houston. He labored for hours. My memory was cloudy after my surgeries, but a few days later I clearly remember Chaz holding up a mirror so I could see what looked like an acceptable version of myself.
A specialist at the hospital had studied my tongue, professed herself satisfied with its motion, and told me I might even talk again. Things were looking up. That surgery failed, too. They all failed, I believe, because of radiation damage before the first one. I sensed that my surgeons on all three procedures were personally saddened by the outcomes.
I was not just a case for them. Microsurgery is painstaking, long and unimaginably difficult. I imagine the surgeon invests so much of his skill in the process that when a procedure fails, he mourns.
I never thought it was their fault. I've written before about how I've come to terms with my appearance. The best thing that happened to me was a full-page photo in Esquire, showing exactly how I look today. No point in denying it. No way to hide it. Better for it to be out there. You don't like it, that's your problem.
It will be used in a medium shot of me working in my office, and will be a pleasant reminder of the person I was for 64 years," Ebert wrote in his blog published by the Chicago Sun-Times. A Scotland-based company, CereProc, reconstructed Ebert's voice using archived footage of him from his show "At the Movies. Ebert's chin is a silicone prosthesis that is similar to dentures in that it's not meant to be worn all the time.
David Reisberg, a maxillofacial prosthodontist at the University of Illinois Medical Center in Chicago, helped create Ebert's prosthetic chin. The prosthesis rests on Ebert's shoulder blades and is almost like a collar, Reisberg said. Since he doesn't wear the chin every day, it's unlikely there will be any complications, which would be minor. Reisberg also said that reconstructive surgery is generally the best option, but Ebert suffered from complications from previous procedures.
Reisberg couldn't elaborate on those problems because he wasn't involved in that part of Ebert's cancer treatment. Surgeons say silicone implants and silicone prostheses are two options for facial reconstruction. Depending on the severity of the facial trauma or personal preference, patients may also opt to use their own tissue. He told the magazine that he was happy with his life, but he also described his difficulties since the surgeries, which also took away his ability to speak.
But in a blog post earlier this week, Ebert showed a picture of himself with the prosthesis painted to match his skin tone.
It will be used in a medium shot of me working in my office, and will be a pleasant reminder of the person I was for 64 years.
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