tinhuviel | Entries tagged with dentist

The past couple of days have seen me regain my lost focus on things I needed to do. Along with it was a wonderful spurt of energy, which I have tried to utilise for best effect possible. Yesterday, in particular, resulted in a great deal of Shriek dissemination. I'm thinking knowing I'm going to be taken off life's stage for a goodly portion of the weekend that spurred the flurry of activity.

Late tomorrow morning, I'll be going back under the knife - and "sander" - at the dentist's office. "But why?" you may ask. "I thought you got a full set of dentures!" And you would be more than justified in any confusion this has imposed on you. My permanent teeth never fit me correctly, but I was waiting for the gums to heal more before I went for any adjustments. The problem only got worse over time, though. The dentures are too large for my mouth to rest with my lips closed. I have to work at keeping my mouth closed, which gives me a distinct chimpanzee appearance. If I don't close my mouth, I look like this dog.

(Click the pic to learn more about Tuna)

When I laugh or smile, Tuna is replaced by Mr. Ed. But it's not the aesthetic that distressed me as much as the health concerns. Because the teeth were so large and ill-fitting, I couldn't use them to bite food, and there wasn't enough room in my mouth to even chew properly. The act of grinding the teeth together in an effort to chew was not only unsuccessful, but excruciating. Being a GBS patient, I have to chew my food beyond thoroughly. Any small amount of unchewed food can get caught in my tiny digestive track, which means it will come back up. My inability to chew resulted in a lot of vomiting so, almost a year out, I'm still on a soft food diet. Let's just say I'm fortunate to love potatoes and cottage cheese so much.

Then, there was my speech. I've always been very self-conscious about my speech, because of the variety of accents in my family and, upon entering school, being teased for having a lisp. At the age of 6, I began speech therapy with myself. I obsessed over tongue-positioning to cloak the lisp and, a couple of years later, I was almost lispless. That didn't stop the kids from doing what kids do, though, so speech became an issue for me early on. Obviously, without fangs in my face, and because of my almost life-long practice of tongue positioning, my impediment is magnified. With the teeth in, I have a whole new set of speech problems, from sounding like Gopher in the Winnie the Pooh cartoons to slurring my words to the point of sounding like a drunk zombie politician on the campaign trail. I have to repeat everything I say, all the time. This is particularly frustrating when I go see Dr. Harrington. He's deaf as hell and my unintelligible blarghing is counter-productive to a successful talk-centric session.

The combination of pain, inability to properly eat or speak, and looking like the ugliest Osmond in all of Utah drove me back to the dentist last week to hopefully get them adjusted enough to where I could lead just a fraction of a normal life. I saw a different dentist in the office that day, one Dr. Habashi, who is hubba-hubba-level handsome. Unlike the dentist who took me on after my first dentist, Dr. Preber, moved to Northern California, Dr. Habashi listened to everything I had to say, noted by areas in my mouth that I was not exaggerating, and gave me a thorough exam, including another full digital imaging of my head. After gathering all the evidence, he gave me the bad/good news. The bad news is I'm one of those rare individuals who, instead of having the occasional, inevitable bone shard still in my gums work its way out as the gums healed, some of the shards established residence and began developing spurs. Even though I did have a couple of shards work their way out, which is quite normal, it turned out that I had a few more that remained, forming hard knots all over my gum lines, top and bottom. This was keeping my gums inflamed and made wearing the dentures pretty much impossible and agonising.

The good news is, this can be fixed! He set me up an appointment for a second oral surgery to basically "sand down" my gums and remove any bone left behind from the first surgery. I will then have to be refitted again for properly-fitting dentures. Thanks to b_bopper55, I will be able to pay for the second surgery, but the new teeth are obviously free, considering they were not made correctly, and did not function in any way dentures are supposed to work. So, hopefully soon, I'll stop being left-side Ren and finally transform into right-side Ren.

I'm thinking that this surgery may be worse than the initial extraction surgery. There's an image of a NYC high-rise construction worker ambling into the operation room after I'm put out, revving up his industrial electric sander and wearing a grin that can't say anything but "Serial Killer in Training." So, I'm trying to get as much writing and advertising done today as I can. I've already alerted the band that I will probably be incommunicado for most of tomorrow and all of Sunday, and I am finishing up a rudimentary outline of the five main characters of The Harming Tree. I've been writing a lot of late, but all of it is currently disjointed, as I write what is "given" me, and that process is never a consecutive narrative. So, yeah, I may be posting a good bit about Shriekback today, as well as posting my 5-character study with accompanying anchor images.

Mood: busy
Where? the house
Music: Bear McCreary - Wander My Friends

The year Aunt Tudi died, I essentially stopped eating much of anything and, nine times out of ten, what I did eat would come right back up. One of the unfortunate side-effects of having gastric bypass surgery is your teeth falling victim to a combination of frequent vomiting and vitamin/mineral deficiencies.

The last half of 2011 saw the beginning of my teeth's hasty demise. It didn't help that I inherited my father's soft enamel. By the time I moved out to San Diego, I had small cavities in pretty much every tooth. Even though I began eating a little more and keeping most of it down, the damage was already done, and the decay took my mouth as its permanent bitch.

I ended up having to go to the dentist in the hope of at least saving two of my front teeth; however, the extent of my dental issues dictated that I had one of two choices. The first choice was to get a deep cleaning, and root canal on every tooth, followed by caps. The cost was well over $40,000. The other, much cheaper, choice was dentures. I'm getting help to get this done, first by The Mother Unit, then by a friend.

After making the decision to go with dentures, I came home and, just a few days later, had a piece of one of my front teeth come out, and the tooth next to it, also a front one, bend outward. This happened over Memorial Day Weekend. It was unpleasant, to say the least, but the dentist was able to work me in on Tuesday, when the office opened again. Before I could even get there, though, the Steve Buscemi tooth broke off the rest of the way, right at the gumline.

They were able to get it out without having to remove the other tooth as well, and they moved my full extraction up by a week, to today.

At 10:00 AM, I showed up, and gave the staff problems with my funky, small, rolling veins, but was eventually knocked flat out only to wake up 45 minutes later with temporary dentures and an assload of bloody gauze shoved in my face. The oral surgeon explained that the dentures wouldn't fit very well, and would probably cause me all manner of pain because of that, and because I had a mouth full of bloody holes in my head.

He was right. Even though I was dealing with three toothaches already, those phantom aches, combined with the very real bloody hole aches and the painful damned temporary dentures has me feeling sorry for myself. But I own it. I admit it. I'm a big wiener when it comes to pain. I fret. I mope. I whine.

But I'm also grateful, because I know this is the worst of it. Well, tomorrow will probably be worse, because the second day of any kind of surgery recovery has always been that way, or that's been my experience. By Monday, I should be feeling a bit better, and might be able to actually eat and drink. As it stands right now, I'm like Ted Striker and his drinking problem in the movie Airplane. My first attempt at trying to get some water in me, after not having any since around 10 PM last night, resulted in most of it going down my front. Then I started drooling blood. Since I got home around 12 PM, I've just been lying on my back to keep from drooling all over everything.

I'm eating really runny instant potatoes like a baby bird, just sticking the spoon (all three spoons of mash I could muster) as far back in my mouth as possible and letting it slide down my throat. I have a squirt bottle of water with which I'm doing the same.

There were a couple of other things I was going to write about, and had written about, but my application unexpectedly quit on me. When I got it back, this is all I had left of my post. So, I'll just post about the other stuff tomorrow. And I'll be sure to write everything out in Word before transferring it to Xjournal. DAMN, I miss Semagic!

Mood: sore
Where? In a Pool of Misery
Music: Like a Stone - Audioslave

Today, I got a surprise at the dentist's office when I went to pay them what I've owed them like forever. First off, they cut my bill by over $400, leaving me only $98 to pay, which just threw me for a loop. Then, when I asked them about setting up my appointment for the dreaded Root Canal. Lois said "I think Dr. Zimmerman had a cancellation at 2 PM. Let's see if we can get you in to see him today." My teeth started to chatter with fright, but I told her OK, and she called his office. The spot was still open, so I was given a surprise Root Canal today. It only took thirty minutes or so and it didn't hurt like I thought it would, but the sound of the drill and the feeling of what he was doing just freaked me out. My imagination gets the better of me at the dentist's office, making anything ten times worse than it actually is. They sent me on my way with nothing for pain, so I was a little scared about that since I can't take aspirin-based stuff and Tylenol does nothing for me.

But I had a Grand Idea. Today is Janice's birthday and I wanted to take her and Aunt Tudi out for a birthday dinner. Janice won't ride with me in the car since I was diagnosed with epilepsy, so she always drives when she goes anywhere with us. I sit in the back seat and enjoy the music 'cos that's how I roll yo...when I don't have to drive. We were going to Outback, so I decided to get drunk. Not tipsy, not looped, but Crazy Damned Drunk so I could forget the freakiness of the Root Canal and not worry about any residual pain for a while. I ordered a pitcher of their new Strawberry Peach Sangria. It's described thusly (that's a good word.):

The sweet goodness of fresh pureed strawberries and peaches is mixed with Malibu Pineapple Rum, Sutter Home White Zinfandel, pineapple juice and garnished with fresh sliced strawberries.

Well, since I couldn't eat all that well, with half my head still numb (I could only flare one nostril, it was funnier than hell), I drank my supper. By the time we left, I was Crazy Drunk and loving the world, which is saying a lot for a misanthrope.

When I got home after mailing

acook's commission dough and getting Uncle Michael a meal from Arby's (he preferred that to Outback, 'cos he's crazy), I sat down at the beloved computer and began to check mail, LJ, and Facebook. Something told me...Okay, the alcohol told me to write Barry about the new package I'm sending him. I came through as Crazy Drunk, even suggesting that I wanted a Scotsman. I'm sure he's gonna think to himself "Oh dear, my Stalker has gone off the deep end." I did tell him I was drunk though, so it should be okay. But OMIGAWD. HAHAHAHAHAHA!

My feeling is coming back and my buzz is wearing off, and I'm not in pain, so I think it's gonna be good. After this storm passes, I'm gonna get the dogs ready for bed and head that way myself. It's been a helluva day.

Mood: drunk
Where? home
Music: Paul Young - Ku-Ku Kurama

Currently, I'm looped on 7.5 Lortab and still eating amoxicillin like it was Pez candy. The receptionist at the dentist's office told me that I may need a stronger antibiotic, since I've been on this for almost a week and it doesn't seem to be working. Dr. Wyss told me to call him any time over the weekend if I needed him. I love him so much.

Before I went back to Dr. Wyss's for more pain meds, since he's closed on Friday, I spent the majority of my day at Spartanburg County Administrative Offices and the Social Security Office because SSO believed I owned two pieces of land. I had to go to the assessor's office to get that straightened out and get proof that I did indeed only own one piece of property. My social worker informed me that I would have probably already have received my retro SSI pay had it not been for this mix-up on my property. They believed that I had been less than a little honest regarding this and that I actually owned 101 Pauls Drive as well as 105 Pauls Drive. Once I got that sorted, I applied for Homestead Exemption, so that my taxes would be cheap-o, thanks to my being disabled.

I got all my paperwork in order, then made my way to the Social Security Office. Ms. Fincher made copies of everything she needed, then said she'd re-apply my disability claim. Because of their mistake, I'm going to have to have to wait one, maybe two more weeks, before receiving any retro pay. That means I have to wait on my root canal as well. Hopefully, I'll only have to wait until next week. In the meantime, the Mother Unit is loaning the money for my meds, so I don't try to lop my own head off with a dull butter knife.

I have been able to eat some boiled cabbage, as it's soft and nutritious. I'm also eating a lot of yoghurt so I don't end up with a yeast infection from all the antibiotics.

One good dollop of news I received was that I will indeed receive a retro SSI cheque as well as a SSDI retro cheque. On top of that, all of my medical charges accrued since 2009 will be covered by Medicaid, so I will be able to settle up with my debtors and pay a large chunk of fundage to the Mother Unit. Even though I feel like I could scream and die from the tooth pain, I do feel blessed to have found out all this good news.

I may have more cabbage to celebrate.

Mood: in PAIN
Where? home
Music: The Cure - Plainsong

As soon as I get my retroactive pay, I have to call and make an appointment for a root canal and crown. Until then, I'm drugged upon amoxicillin and Lortab...and prayer. At least I got to see Dr. Wyss, who was super kind to me. I don't think he has long for this world, which makes me very sad, 'cos I'm not very fond of his replacement. I may change dentists when the time comes. I dunno. I told Dr. Wyss about my book, who asked where the publisher was located. He wasn't fond that it was in Wales, since he's of English origin. I told him I was Welsh, but I loved everything about the UK, including all the people, so it's all good. He asked if it were available at Barnes & Noble, and I told him it was available where all books were made available. I may just buy two more books and give one to him and his receptionist Lois. They've both been so incredible good to me over the years, it's the least I could do for them, even though the story may squick them no end. I warned them that my Vampires did not sparkle and that my hero was actually an anti-hero, so I'm unsure if they'll want to read it at all.

I did make a funny though. I told Dr. Wyss that the book was about teeth, as it was about Vampires. He was amused.

In the meantime, as soon as I get my settlement, I'm to call and schedule a root canal and crown. It should cost around $800. Whoop-tee-doo. After that, I can start getting my teeth back on track after a couple of years of not being able to take care of them. Then I can proceed with biting people again. BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

The rest of the day will consist of eating amoxicillin, Lortab, crying and watching trash TV. It's a plan.

Mood: distressed
Where? home
Music: Air Supply - Sweet Dreams

Today I got to go to the dentist. On the agenda were two fillings and one extraction of a broken tooth. I could have kept the tooth if I got a root canal, but that is just not in my budget because I don't have a budget. Only people with money have budgets. Sooooo, they did the two fillings first and kept having to shoot me up on the Novocain because I just seemed to not get numb. I have this issue with Novocain, sort of a delayed reaction. That being said, the dentist shoots me up with gallons of the medicine to get me numb because he's on a schedule and then, much later, I'm talking like I'm a reject off the short bus. They finally got the fillings in and they look perfect! Before they started with the extraction, the tech took my blood pressure to make sure it wasn't running high. It was 111 over 70 which was perfect for normal people. That's running pretty high for me, seeing as how my blood pressure is usually 40 over 10. They then started shooting me up for the extraction. This time, I got shots in the roof of my mouth (OH JOY!!) and Dr. Malone pulled and tugged on the tooth until the roots let go of my ankle bones.

I was back there for over two hours, lying there like a bear rug with my mouth wide open and a stymied look on my face. Dr. Malone was really groovy though, and very attentive to any pain I may have. He could have rushed through the process and caused me a world of hurt, but he took his time and was more than a little patient with my odd issues with Novocain. My only complaint is with myself and my Novocain resistance. Right now, I can't even feel my eyeballs because of the amount of Novocain I have in my head. It's horrific. I feel like a Botox victim and sound like Mongo. "Mongo like candeh!" It's a good thing this entry is a written one instead of spoken.

Thanks to Dr. Malone, I have gorgeous fangs, though. W00T!

Mood: numb
Where? home
Music: Folk Implosion - Natural One

My visit with the doctor got me a temporary filling until the 15th at which time it will be removed. I had two choices: root canal or extraction. Since I don't have $800 to throw toward a root canal, this tooth and I will be parting company in a few days. The patch up that Dr. Malone did has clove oil in it and now I'm flashing back to Rainbows & Moonbeams and how so many folks there smoked clove cigarettes. I got more than one dirty look when I told them what I was doing when the tooth broke. Apparently eating ice is one of the worst things a person can do. Whoopsie, my bad. The doc prescribed me more pain meds and sent me home until my appointment on the 15 or until I die, whichever comes first.

Mood: high
Where? home
Music: Ronan Hardiman - Breakout

That's me. Since my tooth basically split in two and half of it came out, I know they're going to remove what's left. I hate to have teeth pulled. Feeling that tug and hearing that suction and cracking when the tooth is loosened and removed gets on my last nerve. I have some nerve meds that I'm taking before I go see the dentist. At least I have some help with the fright.

Let's have a poll.

[Poll #1616430]

Mood: nervous
Where? home
Music: Big Country - Harvest Home

I went for a tooth cleaning today. They called it a scaling. What it felt like was that they took each tooth out individually, sandblasted it, and then shoved it into the bloody hole in my gum where the tooth once was. I go back on 2 September for the second part of the scaling. Maybe I'll be lucky and have my head chopped off before then.

Mood: the horror...the horror
Where? home
Music: Shriekback - The Reptiles and I

Well, actually I do, but I have one less. Finally finally finally the day came for my tooth extraction appointment! The doc was certain that it'd be a surgical extraction since part of the tooth broke off when the filling fell out, but it came out in tact with no problems at all. It took him less than five minutes to pull it out, which was less time than it took to get me numb! I'm gonna be in some pain from the big cavern in my head but, after it begins to heal, things will be soooooo much better.

I asked if I could see the tooth and Dr. Wyss said, "If you want it, you can have it!"

So the dental assistant took the source of my suffering and put it in a little plastic box for me to bring home. Anybody who has known me for any length of time knows what's coming next. Yep. A picture!

( teefie! Beware: ugly dental imagery behind this cut..... )

I'm a happy camper, even though I'm still numb from the copious amounts of Novocain injected into my face and I'm a little squicked by the stinky gum hole this tooth left behind when Dr. Wyss yanked it outta my head. I'm taking my tooth to work to freak everyone out. Oh what fun!

Mood: numb
Where? home
Music: Ozzy Osbourne - No More Tears

I just took the "practice test" in my computer class, where I still am, by the way, and it was dead easy. Had it been the real test, I would have made 100, 'cos I was told that each answer I supplied was correct. Here I sit now, waiting on the rest of the class to finish up. This is interminable. I know I have to take this class as a requisite for the Health Unit Coordination program, but being with people who don't know as much about computers as I do is driving me mad. And that's a short drive, let me tell you. Hell, I could walk and save the gas, the trip to madness is so short. Well, I may use a moped to save the knees.

If I had my Joker file, I could work on my latest fic, "The Dentist's Date." Yes, it's inspired by my crescent tooth with the exposed nerve and yes, I already know the Scar Story for this fic. It's particularly unpleasant for anyone with dental issues or phobias. Yeeesh. Hopefully, I'll finish that today, if I can get out of this class early. But I doubt that's gonna happen. I'm surrounded by tackheads, but what should I expect? I'm in South Carolina aka The Armpit of Hell.

I got all narcissistic and submitted my Redeye Grandé story to the

lj_turns10 community. I doubt they'll include it in the book, but at least I tried to be a bit proactive in getting published by any means necessary. Ha!

Oh gawd, this is such a drag. I want to go home, eat some yoghurt, and chill for a little bit before I have to go to work. Something tells me I won't get out of work until around midnight tonight. I don't know why I feel that way, but I do. Gads. I've been up since 6:30 and I'm already so sleepy I could just fall out right here in class and drool all over the table. I wish she'd let those of us who are a little faster than the others do our thing and just go ahead and leave. But she won't. ::bangs head on desk:: I feel like a prisoner in the Computer Lab from Heck.

So far all my classes have been ridiculously easy. If they're all like this throughout the entire program, I'll graduate with honours in 2010. I'll then get to enjoy the fruits of my acedemic labour for approximately 2 years before all hell breaks loose. Go me!

Mood: annoyed
Where? school
Music: the quiet associated with knuckle-dragging and head-scratching

I finally made it to the dentist. Today was the earliest appointment I could get. They took an X-ray and the dentist came in shortly afterward. He said, "I won't ask how you're doing because I can tell by this X-ray that you're doing terribly. In a great deal of pain, I'm certain, what with the exposed nerve and the abscess way up in the gum."

Abscess? I didn't even know I had an abscess. Guess that'll learn me.

The dentist said the tooth will have to go, but he can't pull it until the infection is gone. So he gave me a prescription for antibiotics and pain medication, and he set me up an appointment for a tooth extraction a week from today. I'm supposed to take 500 mg of amoxicillin four times a day for a week so, on the way home, I dropped by the grocery store to get myself a shit load of yoghurt. The last thing I want is a yeast infection, which is pretty much guaranteed if I don't balance myself out.

At least now I'll be able to work without wanting to scream with every single move I make, and I might stop gritting my teeth when I'm talking to clients who, I'm certain, are wondering why I'm so pissed off at them that I'd talk to them like Dirty Harry.

It's gonna be a long week until I can get this fucker out of my mouth.

Mood: in pain
Where? home
Music: Law & Order: SVU