clovehitched | Your Temperament's Wrong for the Priesthood, and Teaching Will Suit You Still Less

Last night I lay on the bed, pain all the way from the bottom left hand side of my jaw to my left eye socket, moaning, feeling exhausted, and waiting for the 50mg of diclofenac I'd taken to work so I could get to sleep.

This morning I woke up ready for my dental appointment in almost no pain at all. Spooky - it's like teeth know.

Anyway, I arrived in good time thanks to the decision to cycle instead of taking the car (at 10am in Cambridge, with the dental surgery on the opposite side of the medieval city centre - good luck with that). Sarah, my usual dentist has now gone; she's Ghanaian and has decided to return to Ghana to ~~poison guppies~~ do dentistry there (she's actually very nice and seems to be only slightly sadistic). Instead I saw a middle aged gentleman who had a very jolly bedside manner and instantly put me at ease (did he pick the wrong profession or something?)

I told him about the problem I'd been having, including how it seems to have mysteriously disappeared this morning. Looking through my note, he said, "ah, I see you're on the pill", which gave me one of those "OMG, I actually pass" moments (consciously I know I do, and hate the word, "pass", but a part of me still doesn't believe it), and I replied, "well, HRT". He said the symptoms I was describing sounded fairly typical and took a look. Instantly (I like it when that happens - it makes me feel less like a hypochondriac) he proclaimed that I had "a very nasty infection in the gum", and poked and prodded, with me saying "ow" at the appropriate points. He then felt the lymph nodes (I think?) in my neck, asked if it was tender (it was), and explained what he thought was going on...

That wisdom tooth is partially erupted. That's left a flap of gum half covering it. Apparently it can sometimes happen that a bit of food or plaque can get under the flap and cause an infection. This has happened before, but never this painfully, or never for this length of time.

He said he would prescribe a course of antibiotics, and that should clear it up. If the symptoms are not gone in 5 days time, I need to come back and see him again, but they should go away in 24 hours once I start taking the pills.

This probably explains why I've been feeling run down for the last week or so - my immune system has been busting a gut trying to fight the infection in my gum.

Also, current thinking is that unless absolutely necessary, the wisdom teeth should be left well alone and they prefer to avoid surgery. However, if this happens three times within a year, then they'd consider that serious enough to look at removing the tooth.

So I now have a course of Amoxicillin, and I've taken the first one. After leaving the dental surgery the gum started to hurt again (it's sentient, I swear), but the antibiotics are now in my blood, and the infection has no chance to survive and must make its time.

By tomorrow lunchtime this should be a non-problem, and I get to avoid surgery, so it's all good.

Originally posted at http://auntysarah.dreamwidth.org/206642.html - you can comment here or there.

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Also, current thinking is that unless absolutely necessary, the wisdom teeth should be left well alone and they prefer to avoid surgery. However, if this happens three times within a year, then they'd consider that serious enough to look at removing the tooth.

Yeah, the tried that one with me. Most of my back teeth on the bottom row are missing as a result.

*hugs*

I prefer this approach over a previous dentist of mine who kept having conversations with me like this:

"Do you want your wisdom teeth removing?"

"Is there anything wrong with them?"

"No, but I can remove them anyway"

"No thanks"

If it makes you feel any better, Ben Summerskill's resigned from the EHRC... I suspect some of the quotations might have you laughing bitterly. (You probably have already been told this via other channels but, well, I saw it and thought of you!)

Good luck with the getting better rapidly!

I'd not heard that yet, so thanks, and yes - that makes my day :-D

Anyone for canapés?

"The statement continued: "It is regrettable that Ben Summerskill has chosen not to re-apply for a position as commissioner, given his experience and expertise..."

No it's not...

I'm guessing you also spotted S'onewall being referred to as a "gay rights organisation"?

lolsob.

Even that's pushing it a bit IMO. These days it seem to behave more like an "establishment queers' dining club".

Summerskill's comments on trevor Phillips are just mind boggingly hypocritical- to condemn a man for standing up for minorities that the sainted Ben doesn't even deign to notice (eg the white working class) just leaves me banging my head on my desk!

Has he added middle class establishment style racism to his other doubtful social 'skills'?

Bloody good riddance, I say!

Glad you've got the tooth issue sorted out. I've a dental check myself next week (shudders!)

Middle class? Grandmama was a baroness.

Hmmm.....that might well explain a hell of a lot............

I did very much get "upper class twit of the year" coming through when I talked to him on the phone.

As someone's who's managed to go their entire life without having a tooth removed (by a dentist) it all sounds rather scary to me. Glad you don't have to go under just yet.

As for 'passing'. I remember when the nurse asked me about my smear for the first time. I was all 'squee'.

I've had a couple removed - it's not that bad for normal teeth - there's this tugging sensation, then your mouth is full of blood, but wisdom teeth can be a bit less accessible.

That happened to me too. Not only did I have the god-awful pain but my gum swelled so much I couldn't open my mouth more than a few millimeters. Once the antibiotics kicked in they ripped the little bugger out. I've only got one left now as all my wisdom teeth decided to grow in sideways or hook over my jawbone :-)

Ow! Sympathies...

I can recommend having them removed under a general (actually a colonel: as I went private and lived in the Aldershot area at the time, it was an army dentist moonlighting) anaesthetic. As he had to stand on my chest to get a decent grip on my teeth (jduging by the soreness and the ground-away bits on the teeth) chemical oblivion was quite good.

Or a sedative: when I had my tooth excavated for a crown, I was such a coward that they gave me this drug that just mildly knocked me out and left me remembering nothing. During which time they removed the contents of my bank acoount (or so it seeemed).

Speaking as one who had tooth implant surgery under local, all I can say is that it was....um...interesting, especially when he had to use a hammer to bash the seating into place :o/

I'm reminded of some of my words to Phil Thomas while he was in the middle of my revision:

"I can feel that"

"Oh, sorry"

Removes scalpel from my genitals, takes suringe of lidocaine, injects more into area next to clitoris, puts syringe down, resumes cutting with scalpel.

"Ah, that's better!"

That happened to me when I was having a mole removed last year. It's an odd sensation, when you suddenly realise that you can feel the scalpel that has up to that point been slicing intangibly through your abdomen...

Luckily my doctor was as sympathetic as yours, added anaesthetic and carried on.

Huh. I guess I was about to have my wisdom tooth out (it used to do exactly what your dentist described on a regular basis) when they changed the rules. I was given a contact and a letter for the surgery that was equipped for these things (mine was in the front room of a suburban bungalow at the time), but life caught up with me, I failed to make the appointment and no one has ever chased me up for it.

I hope the anitbiotics work their magic. They certainly used to work for me.

I had one of those! Even had a similar problem, but my dentist was a) lazy, and b) a gadget fiend so rather then do any of that he just cut off the flap

with his shiny new dental laser.

Incidentally... burnt flesh DOES in fact taste a lot like burnt chicken.

Ewwwwww

Hope the antibiotics knock it on the head.

wow, you've found a nice dentist. Are you sure they weren't faking it for a tv programme?

Hope you are on the mend now

Did you know you can get local anaesthetic (benzocaine) gel that you spread on the gum and it numbs it? Fantastic stuff, providing you've got the right treatment too.

I think it's marketed as Orajel.

Unless, like me, you're allergic to it, and your whole gum swells up and everything is four times more painful.... (Found that one out the hard way >_<)

Thanks. Useful to know for next time this happens (and I'm sure it will). I did consider briefly putting ELMA on it - it's very effective on gums, if a bit toxic, but it tastes terrible (probably deliberately).

Thankfully, the antibiotics appear to have solved the problem for the time being.

Your Temperament's Wrong for the Priesthood, and Teaching Will Suit You Still Less

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