I'm Packin

The wisdom teeth removal went as smoothly as to be expected when dealing with a retarded amount of pain tolerance.

I screamed, I cried... I think Mr. M almost cried, the look on his face after it was over was of a broken hearted man. Very sweet of him to feel so empathetic in my pain. He was a trooper and I love him more for it everyday.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) they had to put me under. I think the dentist didn't want to try and wrestle me every step of the way. After two novicaine injections he claimed the tooth was now "impacted" or at least enough to say he had to put me under. I was fine with that. I woke up in a cushy little bed with my Mr. M rubbing my back.

Each night has been very painful for the bottom tooth. For some reason around 1AM I would get searing pain in my jaw all the way up to my ear. I thought nothing of it since during the day I had little to no pain (granted I'm chalked full of painkillers, but who's counting).

Last night I slept for maybe 1 solid hour total. So this morning I emailed my boss telling her I'd be in at noon if I could get this pain under control. Since I also had to take Mr. M to the airport this morning at 5AM!!! I was in much need of some sleep. Around 10ish my oral surgeon's office called to check in on me and see how the healing was coming along.

I explained to the 12 year old who had to be on the other end of the phone that I had pain at night but not during the day so everything was fine. She said, "oh, no... you have dry sockets." I was like...errrrr NO.. did you hear me!!?? I said it only hurts at night. To which she quipped, "yup, dry sockets, hold on a minute and I'll tranfer you so you can make an appointment."

I was bewildered. I thought dry sockets were these insanely painful never ending worse than giving birth kind of things. The next lady picked up the phone and said, "how's 1 oclock for you". I tried to explain that I most likely didn't have dry sockets but sure I could come in at 1 if they really wanted me to.

I called my boss explained the situation, called Mr. M who was now in Vegas and he said the same thing, "you dont' have dry sockets... I thought those were supposed to be blindingly painful."

I get to the dentist's office early hoping they can get me in and out so I can get some work done today and not have to use all my sick leave. The dentist comes in ... looks briefly at my mouth, presses on my jaw bone, which hurt like hell and said, "yup... dry sockets."

He then begain to pick something out of the gaping whole in my jaw bone and stuff it full of gauze. The gauze was soaked in the nastiest tasting stuff ever. It's like a cross between ambesol and the yucky stuff my mom used to put on my thumb so I wouldn't suck it as a kid. It was uncomfortable and painful... but not excrutiating or anything.

So I asked him about the pain thing... why didn't it hurt. The dentist said that because I was so evenly medicated it hurt but didn't REALLY hurt. That because I was not allowing myself to have a lapse in pain meds that I never really felt the true pain. If the pain I felt was ALREADY masked by pain pills I can't even imagine the torture it would have been to be without my beloved vicoden.

So... I've been instructed to take a WHOLE vicoden before bed. Come back on Wednesday to re-pack the already packed hole in my jaw and continue behaving as normal.

This sucks a big fatty.