Dental Diaries - Episodes IV & V

The last two weeks in a large rambling, third-person nutshell...

When last we saw our heroine she had three temporary crowns and was awaiting yet another that hadn't been started on yet. And she was still having the same horrid dull ache in the area of the mystery tooth - which had had a root canal done three years ago (by another dentist), yet never felt quite right for years then turned grey out of nowhere one day beneath the composite white crown. So she went to her new dentist, who thought it might be a faulty root canal (too short), and he referred her to an endodontist, who discovered the tooth in front of that one was in dire need of a root canal and the mystery tooth was sort of forgotten. Except that the new dentist then removed the three year old crown and found there was decay beneath the tooth, which was removed and a new lovely smooth porcelain crown was ordered up to replace the yucky composite crown, which our heroine thought might be causing the aching because it was rough and not very hard (she grinds her teeth incessantly).

So in she goes when the three new crowns are ready, but has the foresight to warn the dentist that the mystery tooth still does not feel right, so he agrees to put the crown on with temporary cement and "wait and see" how it feels. And the newest root canal tooth gets it's tiny porcelain crown. But then it comes time to put the gold crown on the back upper molar (which had a gold crown on it but she had ground it down to a jagged mess). With so much going on in that area (all three teeth are on the back left) she didn't think she had any sensitivity in that tooth, but when the dentist cemented it on she just about came up out of the chair as a jolt of lightning went through that tooth. "It must be the cement", the dentist proposed, "sometimes it causes extra sensitivity".

One week passed and it was time for the next visit, but our heroine accidentally gave herself food poisoning with some tainted Alfredo sauce so the visit was put off another week after an uncomfortable sleepless night. The gold crown's sensitivity seemed to be lessening with time, but the mystery tooth still ached. So this past Monday it was time for the next appointment, which was supposed to be to replace a third destroyed crown (grinding, grrr) and fix a small filling on a front tooth. The dentist fought with and succeeded in removing the old damaged crown and discovered that not only was there major decay beneath it, but also on the edge of the tooth behind it (sigh). So he went to work on the newly discovered problem tooth, having to do a build-up on it before he could do molds for the new crown, which he had to also do a build-up on because of all the decay beneath the old crown.

In between taking molds of her mouth, he decided to work on the front tooth, but since it had been over an hour since he gave her a shot in the front of her mouth (he had been busy on the unexpected tooth), when he began drilling the old filling out, she screamed in pain. Oops, not numb anymore, needs another shot... He tries once, twice, hmmm, something's wrong with the needle, gets a new one from his assistant. So more anaesthetic, now her nose, face and tongue are numb. Killing time, he decides to do the upper mold. Which makes her gag, and is of a new material which did NOT want to come out without taking some of her front teeth (at least it felt that way).

But after almost three hours of forcing her TMJ-ridden jaw to stay open, and get yanked on with pliers, sawed at, drilled and other indignities, the two fillings were finally done, and the temporary crown was in place. Since her hubby had his gums scraped that morning at the same locale, she stopped and got ice cream on the way home for both of them, then passed out in bed for a few hours.

And awoke with the whole side of her facen swollen. Holy crap it hurt! All the way from her eye socket to the bottom of her jaw it's tender. That's weird, the only allergic reactions she usually gets from the shots are itchy hands. Maybe it's because she fell asleep on it, maybe she accidentally bruised it by laying on it... The ice cream came in very handy.

But the next day it's still swollen, and the day after that her gums are swollen also, this can't be good. She calls the dentist but he's out of town, "try warm salt water and Advil" she's advised and "call us in the morning if it's not better". But she's a bit more concerned about it than just the discomfort, what if a sinus is infected? Maybe something nasty got in her system from the defective needle... Three days and it's getting worse not better. And the irony is her husband had major gum work the same day and he was perfectly fine the next morning, no soreness or swelling at all. And the mystery tooth on the opposite side of her mouth still hurts so her jaws are sore from trying to eat and not injure herself any further (sigh).

Tune in tomorrow for the next episode, will the swelling be gone or will she be rushed to the emergency room in a hallucogenic fever? One thing is for certain, though, she will NOT be awake by noon Friday morning when her dentist office closes so it should be an interesting weekend.

Posted by Morticia at July 30, 2004 04:11 AM | TrackBack