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Home > Michelle's Blog > Previous Postings > 07/26/07
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Previous Postings |
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July 26, 2007:
Beep, Beep, Beep – Ma’am, You’ll have to step over here. There seems to be some metal on your bodyAnd, last but not least, the rest of the story…
…so I went 17 years with this root canal that never seemed right. Every time I touched that part of my face, it seemed like it was bruised, or something just a little weird. But of course, because of my fear of the “Drill Master”, I never told anyone of this tenderness, because, of course, we all say the same thing – “Have you gone to the dentist yet?” NO!
I was down visiting my parents in Iowa on this particular day 17 years after my root canal and all at once, my cheek started growing. Yes, it was the cheek covering my root canal. And it became pretty large, pretty fast. My mom was giving me Advil and ice to try to get the swelling to go down. Mom’s Rock!
So I left their home a day early and headed back to Minnesota to make the dreaded visit to the dentist. Well, right away, he said, “We need to get the swelling down. Take these antibiotics and come back in three days. Then we’ll send you to a surgeon and see what’s going on in there.” YIKES I thought. A Surgeon?? I’ve never been to a surgeon – not even for another part of my body, so this seemed very scary.
I took the pain killers, and despite my urge to leave the country or have all my teeth pulled and get false teeth or anything else radical, I went to the surgeon. The chair had never seemed bigger or harder or scarier, but I climbed in. He shot me up with Novacain – a lot of it – and then cranked my cheek up. I’m sure it was not a pretty sight from his view. He started cutting through the gums. I actually heard the word “Scalpel”. I felt like I was on a T.V. show.
The next part was a blur – lots of drilling, my cheek pulled up to my eye and the arms of the chair screaming for relief. Pretty soon, I noticed he had a needle – and I mean a REAL needle – the kind your mom used to take out slivers. And there was thread hanging on my shoulder. He was STITCHING! I had only had stitches one other time (that’s a good story too!!!), so this was new to me.
When he got all done, let my cheek down (I think I felt it sticking to my hair by now), and said, “So guess what I found in your root?” My eyes were humongous – “What?” He said, “There was a broken dentist tool in your root. The person who did your root canal (17 years ago, which he did not know) broke his tool in your root.”
Oh my God!!! First thought – how have I been making it through airports without beeping all these years? OK, my real first thought was me choking the dentist that told me, 17 years ago, that he hit a random root, when he really had broken his tool in my root and didn’t tell me, nor did he chose to remove it.
So I let it go and moved on. My tooth never felt better.
What brought all of this to my attention and caused me to write a Blog about it was 3 months ago, when I had a terrible tooth ache (now two years later from the broken tool incident), I was sitting in my dentist chair and he told me I needed another root canal. A HUGE elephant sized tear ran down my cheek.
And, I know you’re thinking right now, WHAT A BIG BABY, but I’m really not a crier. So the dentist asked what was wrong. And I told him this story. He felt so bad for my 17 year pain, that after each step of this root canal, he called me at home that night to make sure I was OK.
I was, and this one was pain free. Still the chair grabbing, sweating brow, saucer-sized eyes while drilling, but no pain. I think I’m on step one of getting over my dentist fear.
Keep smiling and let’s see those pearly whites!!
Michelle