Health warning- long post!
Teeth are so deceiving. Adults normally have 32 teeth and in my opinion you either have the luck to inherit strong healthy teeth or weak, crumbly feeble excuses masquerading as teeth. No prizes for guessing which category my toothpicks fit into!! Couple that with a savage childhood dentist who smacked me once when I was crying in his chair, terrified and petrified, and silver fillings, you have a total dental disaster.
My abject paralysing fear of dentists would see me doing everything humanely possible to not venture into that dental chair until the pain I was in eradicated my paralysing fear of the masked man wielding an ear-piercing drill.
When my sons and I moved to Jo'burg 21 years ago we visited a few dentists but it was only when Morgan became a hairstylist and had the very blessed fortunate to have Jawaad sit in his barber's chair, that as a family collectively our dental lives improved as Jawaad is a dentist and one very much in disguise as an Dental Angel. He has such a calming presence and aura that you immediately feel at ease and even when he is extracting one of my not-so-pearly-whites, I am so relaxed and at ease (and no, not because of the lidocaine or whatever local anaesthetic he has used) I don't recognise myself. I actually look forward to my dental appointments and who, hand on heart, can say that?
In my head I had been planning to make a dental appointment for the inevitable check-up and teeth cleaning and a niggly pain in one of my bottom front teeth on 31 June 2022, reminded me. It was painful enough for me to take a painkiller and as soon as the pain subsided, I completely forgot about it together with calling to make a dental appointment. Days of sinus congestion and waking up with nausea every morning followed; my brain was telling me the nausea was due to the phlegm from my sinuses and I treated the symptoms and got on with life.
Fast forward to Saturday, 16 July 2022. The tooth ache is back though it feels more like it is in the gums and my jaw than my teeth; I swallow painkillers and go out to breakfast with Maure, one of my girlfriends. We have a lovely time and when I return home with the pain making its presence known, I take more painkillers and even that vile stuff clove oil. Those home remedies pretend to work and I even get some sleep that night; Sunday morning though is a very different situation. My entire lower jaw aches with intensity, my lower face is slightly swollen and I am in pain and am extremely grumpy. In desperation I message Jawaad and summon every ounce of stamina to take my Mom to run some errands. We go to the chemist to obtain more painkillers and an antibiotic which Jawaad instructs the chemist to dispense. He is thinking I have a sinus infection infecting my lymph nodes. I have zero personality and apologise for this to my Mom who is very understanding and caring. Eventually I return home and try to rest but the pain is so bad and no medication is helping. The pain continues to crescendo and I begin to feel demented, manic and ferile - if its possible to feel all these things all at the same time.
I rule out an abscess as there is no visible abscess - here I am thinking an abscess has to be visible like a boil or pimple. You can tell I have, thus far, never had an abscess before in my life! Another fast forward to Monday at 6am when after a night of zero sleep and crying with the pain and telling John that I would rather die than live with this pain (and here I was always thinking I had a high threshold of pain!), lying on our couch in the lounge in order to let Johan get some sleep, I phoned Netcare 911. I did feel silly but was beyond desperate and by this stage, my skin over my chin felt very taut and my speech was definitely being affected. What on earth was happening to me?
One way of getting out of work on a Monday morning is being carted off to hospital in an ambulance in your pj's and slippers - the paramedics said I could change into other clothes; frankly I had no energy, no strength let alone desire and gave zero proverbial f*cks about going off to hospital in my pj's and slippers and after all, I was warm and snug in them! You always play the waiting game in Emergency Rooms / Casualties but thank goodness it was not too long a wait until I was seen by the doctor who decreed I was to have blood tests and a painkiller drip was put up. I had left the house zero a mask and lying in a room with a patient on the other side of the curtain alternating between coughing and crying, I lay there thinking how could I be so stupid as to leave a mask at home as Covid-19 is still around ... and was my coughing crying room mate there because of Covid-19? I was mightily relieved to hear that she was there because of a fall and a hurt arm/shoulder. I tried to nap in between informing my boss where I was, assuring Johan that I was ok and being attended to and not wanting to cause alarm let alone panic with my sons. The blood test results showed infection and inflammation and a suspect abscess - where was this invisible abscess? I was soon to find out .....
In my new hospital chariot (ie a wheelchair) I was pushed to the medical suites at Olivedale Hospital to see Dr Bobat, the maxillofacial surgeon who had made time to see me as I was an emergency. Dr Bobat is a somewhat reserved man who does warm up and my pain riddled brain remembered that Jawaad knew him and he had organised for him to see Tristan and treat him about 2 years ago when Tristan had an issue with his plate from a broken jaw injury more than 10 years ago. I was subjected to x-rays and 3D Scans thanks to his very state-of-the-art spaceship like scanning and xray machine. He had mentioned to me that I would be admitted to hospital after seeing him and I would be operated on the following day; upon reviewing the x-rays and scans he did change his mind and plan of action. There was indeed an evil abscess in my bottom gum/jaw and as it had not yet spread further below, he could extract it the following day in a surgical procedure at a day hospital. He also warned me that I would likely lose 2 of my bottom teeth - the prospect of which did not thrill me but I had no choice and I had already decided I would just resort to wearing a mask at all times when out and about as the mask is the perfect disguise for being a toothless wonder. I already wear 2 plates - top and bottom - having lost far too many teeth but my bottom plate would not accommodate the soon to be extracted teeth - c'est la vie. I always knew there was a reason why I never entered a "Best Smile" let alone "Best Teeth" competition!
I confessed to Dr Bobat that I had felt very silly for calling the ambulance and going to casualty but my gut instinct was to do just that. He assured me that I taken the very best cause of action as if I had left the situation any longer (the thought of trying to cope with that pain for any second longer was unimaginable) the abscess would have spread, gone down into my neck and then he would have had to make an incision in my neck to remove the abscess. I felt so much better after that and was able to finally go home (thanks to Alyssa for coming to fetch me), shower and get into everyday clothes and prepare to get organised for my procedure. I was existing in an almost pain-free euphoria thanks to the drip and the antibiotic which had been transmitted into me via the iv drip in casualty. I had a long prescription of drugs to obtain together with the usual process of obtaining authorisation for the procedure; all of which I eventually succeeded in attending to.
I was actually looking forward to the procedure so I could have this invasive poisonous abscess removed though I was feeling slightly anxious but exhaustion won the day and I slept through the nigh thanks to the medication which included a painkiller, steroids and an antibiotic.
More dental adventures and extractions to be continued .....
