Bad Morning

Earlier this week, these dominos fell during a 2 hour window.

• I woke up and got ready for my dental appointment. I was more than ready to swap my temporary crown for a new one. My tooth and jaw hurt since the initial procedure early this month, and my only fear was an exposed nerve being painted with that unpleasant epoxy and then a new crown hammered on top of it. That led to ...
• A bout of nervous bowels  that stopped up my industrial strength Toto toilet. so I was late, and that led to ...
• Some dangerous skidding on the subdivision ice: once as I slid out of my driveway almost into the trash truck, once almost into the most recent street cement pour, once almost into traffic. That led to ...
• A slower than usual drive to the dentist, and that led to ...
• Me being SO late to the dentist that they announced me over the PA as having an appointment with Dr. "Rate," and given that I've never seen another dentist at this office I assume is code for "this woman is ten minutes Late." This led to ...
• A pretty up-tempo initial analysis, in which they discovered that though I said my swollen jaw was better, it was not good enough for poking. This led to ...
• Three shots of numbing agent and a long wait, plus some tears, which led to ...
• Another shot and a nuzzle from the support dog. And then, the nurse put forceps around the temporary cap, I jumped in pain, the cap stayed in the forceps, which led to ...
• The nerve being exposed. It didn't hurt, thank God, but what it did do was bleed copiously, which is evidently how a tooth behaves when a nerve is irreversibly inflamed, so I would need to have ...
• An immediate emergency root canal. (There. That's the last domino.)

This root canal was the express lane version of my previous root canal, in half the time, and at one sixth the cost (pending insurance). I think when I was in last week complaining about my jaw, it distracted me from any tooth pain. That time they banged on that bad tooth with all kinds of instruments, and the tooth didn't hurt at all compared to my jaw.

ANYWAY, now that the diagnosis is inflammation of a nerve in my head, of course I am worried that my brain is inflamed as well. Either the tooth nerve spread to my brain, or the brain inflammation spread to my tooth. Somehow I think that I’ll wake up tomorrow and my feet won't be tingling any more, and my back will be fine, and all my problems will have wandered up into my skull.

Or, alternatively, there could be more to go wrong with my teeth. The dentist's office is prepared for that. They put the temporary crown back on with the temporary epoxy, just so they can easily get to the tooth if SOMETHING ELSE GOES WRONG. In which case I will use the support dog as a canine shield and back out of the office and run to Mexico.

Comments

[KC]

Yikes. All yikes.

(what do you do about inflammation of a nerve in your head?)

[kate]

Oh heavens. nightmare in real time. But drolly told.

[theQueen]

KC - Intravenous steroids is what you do if enough brain nerves are inflamed. People who just have one face nerve inflamed (trigeminal nerve) take medication, and God bless them, becuase that's miserable.
Kate - It was bad. But, they did a good job, and I didn't miss any work. Plus, there was a dog.