Shut Your MOUTH

***Don’t forget to vote in the room makeover contest. Voting for this round goes until Friday**

May I take a moment and expound upon my dental drama. I had this dumb root canal back in February. If you want to read about the root issue (ha, I just made a joke!) you can go here, but suffice it to say I needed to have a root canal on my front tooth. Two appointments of hell and torture and it was done. Then summer happened, and I kind of forgot that I was supposed to make and appointment for a crown. Or maybe I was barely recovering from the traumatic experience and didn’t want to go back. Either way, I had to pull up my big girl panties and make an appointment once school started back up. They told me to make 2 appointments, two weeks apart.

Done.

So, the week after school started, I found myself in the dentist’s chair again.
“Would you like the nose gas?” said the cute and perky dental assistant.
“You bet.”

So, after giving me sufficient time breathing the gas so that I didn’t really care what was going on, they stuck the big old needle in my gums right above my front tooth to numb me up.

OUCH! There’s not enough nitrous in the tank to get me to NOT care about that pain, but I made it through, only shedding a few silent tears.

Then they made me bite down on some gross goo to make a mold of my teeth. Whatever, at least it doesn’t hurt.

Am I out of Maroon 5 songs on this Ipod device they gave me? Time for some Rascal Flats, I guess.

Then they came back later with the drill. Drilling and Drilling and Drilling. Shaving away at my precious front tooth. After what seemed like an eternity, they stopped drilling, and started shoving things around in there. What the what?

Eventually they had whittled that front tooth down to a useless stub and shoved a temporary crown on there. THEN, and only then, did they hand me a mirror and let me look at my new tooth. Actually, they had done a pretty good job matching the tooth that was there, but they weren’t happy with the fit and had to do some adjusting and more shoving. No worries, those are just my gums. They SHOVED that crown back on there and cemented it with…something, and then told me I would have to go to the dental lab for a custom shade match on the permanent crown.
“Do I have to do that right now?” I asked. Please don’t make me go now, I doubt I can even think straight, let alone talk to people.
“No, anytime before Thursday,” she said.
“SThurshday. Got it.” What? IS THAT MY VOICE? You’ve given me a lisp!?
She must have noticed my alarm, because she said I would get used to that soon. I felt my numb lip and stumbled out of there.

I made it home, and went immediately up to bed. It was only about 12:30, and I had another hour before the kids came home, and I think I feel instantly asleep (laughing gas makes me very sleepy–does it do that to you?) I would have been happy to sleep the day away, but Cole needed his social security card in order to start his new job, and Megan needed to visit the BYU museum of art, so I told the kids we would make a quick trip to BYU.

As the numbness began to wear off, I began sneezing. Not just regular sneezing, but SNEEZING! I couldn’t stop. My nose was running and the sneezes were coming. I thought maybe the shot of Novocaine had entered my nasal cavity and set something off. I called the dentist to ask what I should do, because I could not stop sneezing. They tried not to laugh, but I could hear it in their voiced. Laughing at my predicament. They said to take a benedryl and call in the morning, if the sneezing hadn’t stopped.

I could barely drive to Provo. Between the constant need for Kleenex and the impending sleepiness from the antihistamine, I was not a happy camper.

That night was a social for all the exchange students and families, and I had to send Ryan and the kids without me.

By the next morning, things didn’t seem so bad. Still a little itchy and allergenic, but I thought I could manage. I’ll just take a zyrtec, I thought. Well, any allergy meds I took (even 1/2 a pill) made me so sleepy, I could barely function. I made it over to the dental lab in a nearby city to have them examine and take many pictures of my mouth. Oh, the joy.

The lisping got a little better and I thought I could just power through the weird allergy stuff. Who is allergic to a tooth, after all?

By the weekend, I was really wishing I had gone into the dentist on Friday. But what could they do? Take off the crown and put it back on? Then we’d be in the same problem. If I was allergic to the cement, they would have to put another cement on.

Wouldn’t you know it, but Monday was a holiday. I sneezed and scratched my way through it, and on Tuesday morning at about 8, I called the dentist’s office. Told them my predicament with my mouth, eyes, throat were itchy and it was driving me CRAZY all week. Then I would take an allergy pill and then I would be OH SO SLEEPY. “I know my appointment isn’t until next Monday, but I can’t stand this temporary crown one minute longer.” They worked me in at 11. When I went at 11, the girls were seriously laughing. “Did you really have a sneezing attack? We don’t mean to laugh, but it was just so funny! We’ve never had that happen before! Are you allergic to Acrylic? Have you even had acrylic nails?” I felt like crying. I told them I hadn’t ever had acrylic nails, so I wouldn’t know. Weird, again, I know. Seems everyone and their dog do acrylic nails, but I haven’t done it. Not because I may be allergic, just because I haven’t wanted to. After a few minutes, they told me, “ok, the permanent crown will hopefully be ready by 3, if you can come back, but if not, then it will be for sure ready in the morning. We’ll call you.”
Then they called at 3:20 and said, come at 3:30. I got there a bit late because I had to take kids to piano lessons, etc. I got in and they started fitting the new crown by about 4:30. The color wasn’t just right (since it’s a front tooth they want it as perfect as it can be), so they sent me to the dental lab (again–I had already gone there the week before to have my tooth custom color matched). They did a little more shaping and fixed the color, and sent me back. I just wanted this ordeal to be over. Please stop!

Meanwhile, I’m driving on fumes, not wanting to stop and get gas with my ugly snaggle tooth. My children are also at home wondering what’s for dinner, husband is out of town.

I got back to the dentist’s office at about 6. They cemented it in, did all that scraping and cleaning, and sent me off by 6:30.

I drove home relieved to be out of the dentist’s office, glad to be rid of the temp crown, trying to get used to the new one.

That was a week ago. I’m still speaking a bit weird, adjusting to the new tooth. But I’m glad to not be sneezing all over the universe.

So, I’ve had enough dental drama to last the rest of my life, don’t you think?