the underwear drawer

toothache

As nice as it is to be on vacation, it's equally nice to be home. In Coleen's words, "It's nice to be where everything is comfortable and to have all your stuff around you." Word, sister.

So today I went to the dentist to get my chipped tooth fixed and my excavated filling replaced. Turns out the dentist felt the best course of action would be to clear out the filling entirely and place a porcelain cap over the tooth. Fine, you're the boss, as long as I don't have some gold tooth like a rap star. (Unless it was one of the front teeth, and had a diamond in it. Then I would be awesome.) The bad thing about this whole dental plan was that it involved drilling out the rest of my old filling, which came quite dangerously close to the nerve root. Even as the lidocaine was wearing off, I was having some discomfort. By the time I got home, I was in agony. The pain was like that of a thousand rusty nails jammed into my lower jaw. I was literally tearing from the pain. I was convinced that he had nicked the nerve root, and that I would need a root canal. And the worst of it all was that I had no discomfort at all upon going into the dentist's office. I walk in normal, and walk out with a jaw full of nails! What is this medieval torture that you call a dental practice, man? I called the dentist and he gave me another appointment for the end of the day, telling me quite rationally to come in if Motrin and Tylenol weren't doing the trick. I tearfully and a little bit frantically told them that they were not.

But I guess he was right. Three hours later, the pain had abated almost back to normal. A dull ache, but nothing like it was before, and certainly nothing that I couldn't handle. I guess the man knows of what he speaks. Maybe my nerve had still vibrating from fear from the drill bit driving dangerously close to the tooth pulp. And now its calmed down. Man, whatever the reason, I don't care, just as long as it never does that again. Tooth pain like that is something I've never experienced before and would gladly never experience again. I guess its some kind of evolutionary adaptation , so we don't die toothless and hungry in the woods or something, but man, having people mess with my teeth freaks me out.