Since the tinsel incident, Scratch rarely meows

Before the tinsel incident in which Scratch ate tinsel and had to be operated on, she used to be quite talkative. She would always be meowing and chirping and trilling, and I would have conversations with her. Since the tinsel incident, I've only heard her meow a few times. For a while she would just open her mouth and no sound would come out, but now it sounds really scratchy.
Does anyone have any insights on why she stopped meowing?

It's possible that the tinsel cause some minor damage to her vocal chrods.
I swallowed some of that stuff myself when I was a kid, the edges can be a bit sharp.

That would be my guess as well - that she may have damaged her vocal chords.

As most TCS's know, our Mika was born with a defective voicebox and has a strange little huffing noise rather than a meow. It doesn't affect her ability to get our attention when she wants it. She'll come and stand up on my leg and make her little noise when she wants treats or to be picked up. And we all agree at our house that it would be impossible to ignore her because she's so precious.