I have had a deviated septum for years. Finally having surgery next week (septoplasty) to repair it. Just wanted to know if anyone on here has ever had this surgery. What's the few days after surgery like? Pain? Could you breathe better after the surgery? I have sleep apnea praying it will help with this issue as well.

Had it done in 2005 and it did wonders for my breathing. Handful of years later I had pollups develop and had a similar surgery to remove those.
Pain is manageable with prescriptions. More pressure than pain. Ones the stints and gauze is taken out, you'll feel like a new person.

I really need to get this surgery done as well..but now that I'm 50...there is no way I could deal with the recovery. Hell I damn near choke to death every time I go to the dentist leaning back and trying to breathe out of my 80% clogged nose and my throat closing on me...there is no way I could deal with a stint and gauze and mouth breathing! let us know how it goes!

Had it done as a teenager. I thought the worst part was the night of mouth breathing, until they went to pull the gauze out the next day or the day after. After that it wasn't that bad at all. A friend didnt have to have hers packed so I dont know when they do that and when they dont.

had it done in my late 30's along with having my tonsils removed. Nose surgery was no issue. They put tubes in then (no packing with gauze). slight pain when they removed the tubes, but then I could breathe through my nose for what felt like the first time in my life.

I've deviated mine 3 times. Twice they reset it while I was awake - not pleasant.

Last time I was under a general anesthesia.

Every time they packed my nose with gauze.

Worst feeling was when they pulled the gauze out.

Just nut up and get it done. You'll be happy you did!

Had this done in 2014. My deviated septum was bad enough that they took scans of my head and the tech asked if I had ever been in a car accident (I haven't). I believe my ENT also did the balloon treatment in my sinuses in the same procedure. I was under general anesthesia the entire time.

My post-op experience wasn't great and here's the story…
TLDR: enormous nose bleed, hospital visit, packed nose, puked blood.

Some time after the surgery, after they had removed the gauze, I came home from work and immediately started having a nose bleed. Didn't think much of it but it didn't stop and there was a lot of blood. After about an hour of blood just streaming out of my nose we decided to do something. Urgent care wasn't busy and I got sent back right away. The doc pretty much just observed me. I don't remember him doing much at first. He finally said since the bleeding hadn't stop he was going to have to pack my nose. That meant nothing to me because I've never done that. Or when they did it during the surgery I was under anesthesia. Then about 3 male nurses (big dudes, looked like football players) walked in the room. I asked what they were there for and the doc said, "they are here to hold you down", which immediately got my attention.

If you haven't had your nose packed it's probably one of the worst and most painful experiences I've had. And I have a pretty high pain threshold. It's like a tampon. They shoved a cardboard/plastic cylinder up my nose as far as they could to insert cotton gauze. A nose that was already tender from surgery. Those dudes definitely held me down because my back was arching trying to come up off the bed. My wife at the time was in the room and I remember seeing her covering her mouth in horror. That stopped the blood from coming out my nose. Only now it was going down my throat. After looking in my throat repeatedly the doctor finally said they need to transport me to the ER and I might need surgery. So I rode in an ambulance to the ER of a major hospital. ER was busy and they had me on a gurney staged by the nurses station. I started feeling sick. Really sick. I tell someone I'm about to throw up and they give me a bucket and start wheeling me into a trauma room. I proceed to vomit all the blood I had swallowed for the last few hours. It was black and disgusting.

I guess they called my ENT because by 9 or 10 pm he showed up. He said everything looked okay and that I would need to leave the cotton gauze in for a few days. Evidently something hadn't healed completely and whatever blood that had clotted during the surgery came loose. Had a follow up and no issues after.

I wouldn't say it's helped with my snoring but I can breathe a little better. I am very averse to having things put up my nose now. Avoid covid tests like the plague.

Surgery today
Doctor said my deviated septum was significant. Worse pain so far is from my throat hurting from the breathing tube. My nose has been bleeding quite a bit and is sore. I will keep y'all posted. I go back next Tuesday to get the tubes removed.

Had it done several years ago. The results were a gamechanger. It was like holy s***! The amount of air I could get breathing though my nose felt unbelievable.

My entire life prior surgery I never understood when someone said, "oh it's just a little head cold." I always associated a "head cold" with a borderline debilitating pressure headache. Those days are gone. Now when I get "just a head cold" it really is not that big of a deal, my nose is itchy, stuffy and I feel a bit crummy, but I'm not debilitated with a throbbing headache like before.

My pain from the actual surgery was pretty uncomfortable up until they took out the splints. My doctor did not believe in prescribing actual pain meds for the procedure, so I was only on Ibuprofen and that was not enough. Had I had something a bit stronger those first few days, I think it would have been much better. Once the splints were out it was pretty much painless. 2-3 weeks later I could hardly feel any affects from the surgery what so ever other than being able to actually breath through my nose for the first time in my life.

I have a pretty funny story to share with this one. Had a new onset of whistling when breathing through my nose which will quickly make you insane trying to sleep so I got seen by my ENT buddy. He put the camera up there and saw maybe a polyp or something so did a sinus CT scan and found lots of polyps and calcified mucus in my frontal sinsuses and deviated septum. Got some steroids and antibiotics and nasal spray and got scheduled for the OR.

OR took a while due to the goo blocking up the suction but he got it all done. Had the splints in there for a few days with mild discomfort then took them out and no issues.

Not long after we took a long delayed trip to Ireland. We bought this package at a charity auction in 2019 and, due to COVID, didn't get to go until 2023. Flight was fine and everything was going great then on one of the first nights in a rural castle out there I start gushing blood. My wife was sleeping so I'm in the bathroom rolling up and stuffing tissue up my nose trying to get a decent pack and stop the significant blood clots from pouring out. Wife wakes up a bit later and I ask her to get to the pharmacy in the nearby village to get Afrin (oxymetazoline) and some nasal cease to help stop.

She gets to the chemist in the nearby village only to discover that Afrin is RX in EU. They also don't carry nasal cease. So she buys the back up, some tampons, and comes on back. I trim down the tampon and cram it up my nostrils and off we go. It worked great and stopped and no issues.

The next day it happened again in the morning. Repacked it with tampons and headed to our next castle. Luckily we passed through Northern Ireland (UK) and found out Afrin is OTC there. So we found a local chemist and bought some. We also tried to access urgent care at this time as I figured I might need a cautery and there is NOTHING open in Western Ireland on Saturday!

Anyway I'm all good now but be careful about flying post op for a while. That super dry air in the plane is what I blame for my significant bleeding weeks post op.