Monday, November 22, 2010

Apparently, it was ugly

Dental surgery is done. It went well, despite one assistant having to leave...to puke. Which is better than some other time he did this procedure. That time one assistant fainted and the other one ran into the lamp thing that dentists use and then the wall before she fainted. All because this is a fairly messy and icky looking procedure. I think you'll find the term icky in the dentist handbook.

I, on the other hand, didn't care. Scrape out all the bone you want. Cut open as much jaw as you need to. And filling the space in the bone with some poly plastic something or other? Go right ahead. Just...do it quickly, because the giant metal thing you're using to keep my mouth open and cheek back is killing me. And, I think, from what I can tell over the local, it's also tearing my mouth.

The plus side is that it's done. I'll get the use of my mouth back. I need my mouth. You know, for eating or spitting out brilliantly cutting remarks at the right moment to the deserving, or gawking in amazment at people when they do stupid things (yes, that is a necessity. I love the look of embarrasement people get you when you give them that look. The dawning realization that despite being fifty they're acting like they're five)

So at some point* I'll be able to chew on that side of my mouth again. Also a plus, my deeply embedded aversion to mirrors means that it hasn't been difficult avoiding having to see my puffy face. Half puffy. Or half face. Whichever means half my face is completely puffy. The weird thing is - or at least it seems weird to me - it is worse this morning (Monday) than it was right after the surgery (which was Friday). I thought I'd be all better by now. Partially plastic, but all better.

*That point isn't now. And given that the second dentist I saw (my dentist wanted confirmation that the surgery was necessary) pointed out the problem on the other side of my mouth. What? Some other problem? Turns out that the fake tooth I had cemented in 20+ years ago needs to be replaced. I knew there was something wrong-ish going on - floss was catching on something, and eating things like apples I had to avoid that side- but didn't realize it would entail more than a minute to fix it. So still no apples for me. I haven't had an apple since September. Hard to, when you have to bite carefully on one side of your mouth and not at all on the other.

5 comments:

  1. Wow. Gross. I'm so glad I'm not a dentist.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I missed something. What was the surgery for?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hollow in my jaw kept getting infected. Not it's filled with plastic. No more space=no more infection. Hopefully.

    ReplyDelete
  4. How does one end up with a hollow in one's jaw?

    ReplyDelete