Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Face Ache (part 1)

If I didn't have a handy stash of painkillers, then I'd be in agony.

Spent two hours in the dentist's chair having root canal treatment - nightmare. Apparently, most people have only three canals in each of their back teeth. Unlucky me - I had to have four. Quadruple torture!

I can't ever remember it being as bad as this at the dentist's and at one point, I was in such discomfort, I think I was crying. The nurse asked the dentist several times to let me rest my jaw but he was obviously in relentless mood - probably wanted to get it all finished so he could get home in time for his tea.

And then I had to pay him £200 for inflicting pain on me and arrange another appointment next week.

Smiling at me, he said "I bet you hate me right now?"

"Yes, very much so!" I managed to mumble through swollen anaesthetised lips.

Oh and joy, I have a presentation to do tomorrow morning!

7 comments:

  1. This won't make you feel better but... While I was at uni I skipped dental visits for nine years. OK, a while after uni as well.

    I started having trouble with a wisdom tooth that had caught on the one in front and ended up coming in twisted with the crown pressed against the other tooth. Decay resulted.

    At the dentist's I was diagnosed as needing 5 fillings, one filling redone plus root canal (x4, like yourself) on a molar.

    One x-ray, 5-6 visits to the dentist, more dental amalgam in my mouth than you'd need to resculpt the Venus de Milo and it cost me... £75-ish.

    My dentist is an old school friend and the best dental surgeon I have *ever* been to. I have never needed so much as an aspirin after seeing him. I am lucky, and I know it.

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  2. Had a root canal done last year and it wasn't so bad. It hurt my pocketbook more than my mouth. Even with dental insurance, dental work in the US is so expensive. I have to go back next week to put in my permanent crown when I cracked a fillin. And this time, no dental insurance. YOUCH!

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  3. Mosher - £75 is the cost of just ONE of my white fillings...I just can't get an NHS dentist near me so have to pay over the odds for a private one. Hurts both my teeth and my bank balance! :-(

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  4. ....and another reason for leaving the UK. OK, I don't have the problem of not having a dentist although I was traveling around 200+ miles round trip to see mine, in fairness. I always tried to work it in when I was heading home for the footie.

    Of course, I've now not had a dental appointment in well over a year! Not good!

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  5. My wisdom tooth also gave me such trouble. I hate recalling that incident of sitting on the dentist chair for hours just to have my tooth extracted. I was then in TN when I had my extraction. I was supposed to have a vacation at my aunt's; however since she knew several good
    dentists (Germantown TN based), she convinced me to have my ever feared extraction to be done. I was mumbling in pain that time. I was just thankful that the staff were really nice. They attended to my needs at my own cost. That lessens the burden (at least).

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  6. some people believe that benefits of a root canal treatment don't last. This is owing to consequent breaking of teeth after treatment. According to veteran dental experts, this is not the treatment failure but rather the failure in restoration or construction of tooth. Breakage mainly happens to those who fail to get crowns. Therefore, the benefits can last long.
    Reference:
    root canal treatment

    root canal procedure

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  7. Yeah, it doesn't feel like permanent treatment, but then, neither do my crowns! Maybe I should just eat soup for the rest of my life!

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