I Was A Confident 21-Year-Old. Then I Woke Up With A Tube Of Skin Connecting My Cheek To My Chest

I awoke from an 11-hour surgery at University of California San Francisco Medical Center to find that my otolaryngologist had removed not only half of my nose but also half of my upper lip, muscle and bone from my right cheek, the shelf of my right eye, six teeth, and part of my hard palate.

As I tried to shift my body in the bed, I noticed a tug pulling at me from my chest. I looked down to see that a long tube of tissue was suspended from my cheek and attached to my chest. I gasped!

“Help!”...