G
globby
Well-known member
- Joined
- Sep 3, 2009
- Messages
- 127
Ok, after reading Cello, Cielo and Spektyr's journals, I've decided this might help me. My teeth on the other hand is currently objecting to me reading and posting in this forum.
Now, Many may ask "Why dentures already!!!!!!!!!! You're barely an adult!!!" but it's come to the point that I need them do to my neglect to get my braces treatment finished due to an abusive and harassing dentist/ortho.
I do want to note, that while this post will be excruciatingly long, it'll be as painful for you to read as it will be for me to write because im currently holding a rag to the right side of my face with my dominant hand and typing with my left, and constantly running to the bathroom to rinse my mouth out due to this pesky infection on top of thrush... so.. there... we're even! LOL
When I was 12, I had braces put on. Four years later I stopped going to my dentist/orthodontist because the jerk would sit there holding my mouth open to the point of pain for up to 2 hours while talking on the phone about his latest or upcoming vacation with a friend and in the times he actually payed attention to me, he was constantly yelling at me. He would tell me to wear elastics one way, then I'd go for the follow up the next week and he'd scream at me saying "You're supposed to be wearing them this way, are you trying to mess up your own ****ing teeth?!" (yes, this is the way he spoke to me) then I'd follow his instructions again and lo and behold, at the weekly follow up, he hits me with the same line. Week after week of being harassed for his mistakes and him not knowing what he wanted me to do and I put up with it... every single week. Finally, a few weeks later, my father goes in for a procedure and the man ended up slicing my fathers tongue open. That was my breaking point, no more dentist for me.
By now I was 16, not brushing regularly, and refusing to see ANY dentist. This continued until I moved out of my parents house at 19 and moved in with my wonderful boyfriend. A boyfriend who just so happens to be a smoker and I ended up falling into that habit too... ever since then things went horribly wrong.
First, I noticed that while eating a twizzler, a tooth up and broke. Only problem was... It was still connected to the wire of my braces. I remember it so vividly, going into the bathroom of the warehouse my boyfriend was working in, picking the elastics off one by one, and watching the broken tooth fall into the sink. I then preceded to pull out the wire in tears. (Pulling off the wire supposedly was the right thing to do according to a recent dentist who told me that keeping it in could have caused extremely bad infections in parts of other broken teeth being held in place be the wire.)
After that, teeth started chipping off, breaking off or even shattering altogether over the next 3 years.
Around the winter on 2007, two of my lower right molars followed suit. This was my first experience with extreme dental pain. My boyfriend and i had been evicted from his apartment and were living in a room for rent with no car so we had to take the public transit everywhere. I will never forget the looks on everyone's faces as i cried in pain for and hour long trip.
From then until now, things have only gotten worse...... much worse. In my mouth I have more exposed pulp and nerves than teeth. And that doesn't say much considering at least 4 teeth are completely decayed down to the gumline or further.
Now, the reason i didn't go to a dentist sooner wasn't fear anymore, the constant pain cured that. It was the fact that no one would see me until the braces are off and orthodontists refused due to extreme risk of further injury.
Finally, one day at work, all hell broke loose. I was on the ground in front of a full building of customers screaming in pain. One of my teeth had enough. My boyfriend was called to take me to the hospital. Until then, I had never thought there could be a pain that serious without dying, and over the years, I've built up a very high tolerance for oral pain
When I got there the pain had somewhat subsided and the nurse or doctor or whatever decided to tell me what I already knew. "Your teeth are decayed." While trying my hardest not to kick him and scream "no s*** Sherlock"
He then gave me percocet and ibuprofen to deal with the pain and penicillin for the infection, Followed by a list of dental clinics to call for help after hearing my sob story about being denied care from everyone i tried.
So, the percocet did exactly what I expected it to do, nothing. It didn't do anything for my after surgery pain for a hernia operation, wouldn't help now either. Tried calling the clinics to get in ASAP to have the tooth pulled and was denied. "we don't have any appointments until 2 months from now" And when I promptly responded that thats fine, just as soon as possible, I'll make one for then, they told me they don't schedule appointments for that far in advance, I'd have to call Monday. Call Monday, get the same response.
Finally, after talking to a customer from work who i've bonded with over medical issues and things (hugely in fact that i was the only one working that would listen to her sob for 2 hours about her husband dying. She was devistated, screw my job, she needed someone to listen.) and we got to talking about teeth, she only has her four top and bottom front teeth left and was dealing with a similar issue as me. She gave me the card to a really nice dentist who actually took me in and looked at my teeth and gave me more bad news. She couldn't help me. But whats different about her, She took the time to tell me why and to go try the clinic again. Only, She gave me the reason they kept giving me the runaround. For this specific dental clinic, You must first be a patient or be calling in an emergency appointment.
So, after weeks of trying to get an appointment again they either didn't answer
the phones or told me they didn't take patients with insurance or that there are no appointments available.
a week later, the end of June, I ended up in the hospital again and the doctor said "the pain sounds like nerve damage and judging by the looks of my mouth, it's not surprising" He then told me to call the clinic again and that they lied to me about insurance line. This time i was prescribed vicodin and ibuprofen for pain. Again, vicodin didn't work.
I finally got a hold of the dental clinic, told them that i was told to follow up with dental clinic from the hospital (which are both run by the same company) and they saw me. Granted they misunderstood my followup, it still got me in.
When i got in there, i almost made the young DMD cry when she looked at my teeth, she seriously started to tear up because of my age. After looking at my xrays, it was evident to even me that my mouth was to become an oral liquidation sale... Everything Must Go!!! What wasn't apparent to me though, was what the hell was causing this pain exactly. Looking at the xray, it seems that all of my wisdom teeth are slightly impacted and the exposed nerve pushing into the tooth for the one, and the lower one pushing into the other teeth causing a banded tooth to start collapsing was the culprit.
I still have yet to find a pain med to work. they just gave me a script for ibuprofen (because that's the only pain med that still has any effect on any pain in my body anymore) and for more antibiotics.
She also had me fill out consent forms for IV sedation and wisdom teeth extractions. Now, the people at the reception desk are rather cold at the clinic but the dentist and oral surgeon i talked to were wonderful, and what's even better.. The price of getting iv sedation and full extractions INCLUDING wisdom teeth? only $195. Thank god my grandmother could send me a check to use because the payment must be made up front at the time of scheduling the appointment(which is very understandable)
I'm now scheduled for the full mouth extraction on October 6th. Everyone at work is excited for me, my family is excited for me and thanking god i'm finally doing something about my mouth. From what I've been told by my General Practitioner, It's amazing that the infections never moved to my bloodstream.
While waiting for this appointment though, I've made another trip to the hospital because it seems a nerve is damaged on the other side too, but that one's just annoying, but when they hit at the same time, i wanted to die. And I got bad news. Due to my teeth being so bad and the fact that i can get on a whole month eating a single meal, I've most likely developed anemia, I need to get the blood work today before I go to work.
But back to my teeth, I made another visit to my doctor to set this up and was given more pain medications and antibiotics. I've now developed thrush from being on penicillin 2 times in the past month, so he gave me a prescription for Nyacin, I still have a really BAD infection at the same time so he gave me cleocin, one of the strongest antibiotics out there, and Dilaudid for pain.
Now, if you dont know what Dilaudid is... I envy you. Dilaudid is one of the strongest pain narcotics out there. It is a derivative of heroin and is supposidly 8 times stronger than morphine. AND YET... it does not phase the pain.
I'm not sure how the hell I'm going to survive until the 6th, and then dealing with phantom pain which i've already been noticing from some other teeth, the nerve damage, the pain from the antibiotics. I love what antibiotics do, but i hate the fact that they agitate the infection to kill it.... and the causing of thrush... my mouth's so dry, and the more water i swish, the dryer it gets, I've been mixing up my swishing though. when it acts up, i swish water for the first 4 times it acts up, and then salt water for the 5th and heavily diluted alcohol free mouthwash on the 6th, then repeat, it seems to be working but for the past 5 hours, due to the nerve, i've been swishing water only and my tongue is soooo dry, and i cant even suck on an ice cube because my teeth are that sensitive
Ok, while typing this, it's taken me 3 hours (mostly 1 handed) and the nerve pain acted up 7 times.... i think it's time for me to attempt to get some sleep, i'll update tonight (it's 4am here) or tomorrow for more information on what's getting done, how and why.
Now, Many may ask "Why dentures already!!!!!!!!!! You're barely an adult!!!" but it's come to the point that I need them do to my neglect to get my braces treatment finished due to an abusive and harassing dentist/ortho.
I do want to note, that while this post will be excruciatingly long, it'll be as painful for you to read as it will be for me to write because im currently holding a rag to the right side of my face with my dominant hand and typing with my left, and constantly running to the bathroom to rinse my mouth out due to this pesky infection on top of thrush... so.. there... we're even! LOL
When I was 12, I had braces put on. Four years later I stopped going to my dentist/orthodontist because the jerk would sit there holding my mouth open to the point of pain for up to 2 hours while talking on the phone about his latest or upcoming vacation with a friend and in the times he actually payed attention to me, he was constantly yelling at me. He would tell me to wear elastics one way, then I'd go for the follow up the next week and he'd scream at me saying "You're supposed to be wearing them this way, are you trying to mess up your own ****ing teeth?!" (yes, this is the way he spoke to me) then I'd follow his instructions again and lo and behold, at the weekly follow up, he hits me with the same line. Week after week of being harassed for his mistakes and him not knowing what he wanted me to do and I put up with it... every single week. Finally, a few weeks later, my father goes in for a procedure and the man ended up slicing my fathers tongue open. That was my breaking point, no more dentist for me.
By now I was 16, not brushing regularly, and refusing to see ANY dentist. This continued until I moved out of my parents house at 19 and moved in with my wonderful boyfriend. A boyfriend who just so happens to be a smoker and I ended up falling into that habit too... ever since then things went horribly wrong.
First, I noticed that while eating a twizzler, a tooth up and broke. Only problem was... It was still connected to the wire of my braces. I remember it so vividly, going into the bathroom of the warehouse my boyfriend was working in, picking the elastics off one by one, and watching the broken tooth fall into the sink. I then preceded to pull out the wire in tears. (Pulling off the wire supposedly was the right thing to do according to a recent dentist who told me that keeping it in could have caused extremely bad infections in parts of other broken teeth being held in place be the wire.)
After that, teeth started chipping off, breaking off or even shattering altogether over the next 3 years.
Around the winter on 2007, two of my lower right molars followed suit. This was my first experience with extreme dental pain. My boyfriend and i had been evicted from his apartment and were living in a room for rent with no car so we had to take the public transit everywhere. I will never forget the looks on everyone's faces as i cried in pain for and hour long trip.
From then until now, things have only gotten worse...... much worse. In my mouth I have more exposed pulp and nerves than teeth. And that doesn't say much considering at least 4 teeth are completely decayed down to the gumline or further.
Now, the reason i didn't go to a dentist sooner wasn't fear anymore, the constant pain cured that. It was the fact that no one would see me until the braces are off and orthodontists refused due to extreme risk of further injury.
Finally, one day at work, all hell broke loose. I was on the ground in front of a full building of customers screaming in pain. One of my teeth had enough. My boyfriend was called to take me to the hospital. Until then, I had never thought there could be a pain that serious without dying, and over the years, I've built up a very high tolerance for oral pain
When I got there the pain had somewhat subsided and the nurse or doctor or whatever decided to tell me what I already knew. "Your teeth are decayed." While trying my hardest not to kick him and scream "no s*** Sherlock"
He then gave me percocet and ibuprofen to deal with the pain and penicillin for the infection, Followed by a list of dental clinics to call for help after hearing my sob story about being denied care from everyone i tried.
So, the percocet did exactly what I expected it to do, nothing. It didn't do anything for my after surgery pain for a hernia operation, wouldn't help now either. Tried calling the clinics to get in ASAP to have the tooth pulled and was denied. "we don't have any appointments until 2 months from now" And when I promptly responded that thats fine, just as soon as possible, I'll make one for then, they told me they don't schedule appointments for that far in advance, I'd have to call Monday. Call Monday, get the same response.
Finally, after talking to a customer from work who i've bonded with over medical issues and things (hugely in fact that i was the only one working that would listen to her sob for 2 hours about her husband dying. She was devistated, screw my job, she needed someone to listen.) and we got to talking about teeth, she only has her four top and bottom front teeth left and was dealing with a similar issue as me. She gave me the card to a really nice dentist who actually took me in and looked at my teeth and gave me more bad news. She couldn't help me. But whats different about her, She took the time to tell me why and to go try the clinic again. Only, She gave me the reason they kept giving me the runaround. For this specific dental clinic, You must first be a patient or be calling in an emergency appointment.
So, after weeks of trying to get an appointment again they either didn't answer
the phones or told me they didn't take patients with insurance or that there are no appointments available.
a week later, the end of June, I ended up in the hospital again and the doctor said "the pain sounds like nerve damage and judging by the looks of my mouth, it's not surprising" He then told me to call the clinic again and that they lied to me about insurance line. This time i was prescribed vicodin and ibuprofen for pain. Again, vicodin didn't work.
I finally got a hold of the dental clinic, told them that i was told to follow up with dental clinic from the hospital (which are both run by the same company) and they saw me. Granted they misunderstood my followup, it still got me in.
When i got in there, i almost made the young DMD cry when she looked at my teeth, she seriously started to tear up because of my age. After looking at my xrays, it was evident to even me that my mouth was to become an oral liquidation sale... Everything Must Go!!! What wasn't apparent to me though, was what the hell was causing this pain exactly. Looking at the xray, it seems that all of my wisdom teeth are slightly impacted and the exposed nerve pushing into the tooth for the one, and the lower one pushing into the other teeth causing a banded tooth to start collapsing was the culprit.
I still have yet to find a pain med to work. they just gave me a script for ibuprofen (because that's the only pain med that still has any effect on any pain in my body anymore) and for more antibiotics.
She also had me fill out consent forms for IV sedation and wisdom teeth extractions. Now, the people at the reception desk are rather cold at the clinic but the dentist and oral surgeon i talked to were wonderful, and what's even better.. The price of getting iv sedation and full extractions INCLUDING wisdom teeth? only $195. Thank god my grandmother could send me a check to use because the payment must be made up front at the time of scheduling the appointment(which is very understandable)
I'm now scheduled for the full mouth extraction on October 6th. Everyone at work is excited for me, my family is excited for me and thanking god i'm finally doing something about my mouth. From what I've been told by my General Practitioner, It's amazing that the infections never moved to my bloodstream.
While waiting for this appointment though, I've made another trip to the hospital because it seems a nerve is damaged on the other side too, but that one's just annoying, but when they hit at the same time, i wanted to die. And I got bad news. Due to my teeth being so bad and the fact that i can get on a whole month eating a single meal, I've most likely developed anemia, I need to get the blood work today before I go to work.
But back to my teeth, I made another visit to my doctor to set this up and was given more pain medications and antibiotics. I've now developed thrush from being on penicillin 2 times in the past month, so he gave me a prescription for Nyacin, I still have a really BAD infection at the same time so he gave me cleocin, one of the strongest antibiotics out there, and Dilaudid for pain.
Now, if you dont know what Dilaudid is... I envy you. Dilaudid is one of the strongest pain narcotics out there. It is a derivative of heroin and is supposidly 8 times stronger than morphine. AND YET... it does not phase the pain.
I'm not sure how the hell I'm going to survive until the 6th, and then dealing with phantom pain which i've already been noticing from some other teeth, the nerve damage, the pain from the antibiotics. I love what antibiotics do, but i hate the fact that they agitate the infection to kill it.... and the causing of thrush... my mouth's so dry, and the more water i swish, the dryer it gets, I've been mixing up my swishing though. when it acts up, i swish water for the first 4 times it acts up, and then salt water for the 5th and heavily diluted alcohol free mouthwash on the 6th, then repeat, it seems to be working but for the past 5 hours, due to the nerve, i've been swishing water only and my tongue is soooo dry, and i cant even suck on an ice cube because my teeth are that sensitive
Ok, while typing this, it's taken me 3 hours (mostly 1 handed) and the nerve pain acted up 7 times.... i think it's time for me to attempt to get some sleep, i'll update tonight (it's 4am here) or tomorrow for more information on what's getting done, how and why.