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All 4 wisdoms out, I finally did it!

S

Spazz_E1

Junior member
Joined
Jan 19, 2010
Messages
4
I am 21 hours out of oral surgery and here to tell my tale.

I am posting this for those out there like me who are frantically seeking comfort and straight up facts about a wisdom tooth extraction, not horror stories or "it's no big deal, you'll be fine" stories that still leave us fearful and unknowing.

I had put off getting my wisdoms extracted for 9 years. Scared, terrified, utterly horrified: these terms don't seem to do justice to how I really felt about having the procedure done. I think I would rather have been shot in the leg than have this procedure done (sound familiar to anyone?)

The top two teeth had erupted fully, although at odd angles that would affect my cheeks sometimes. The bottom two partially erupted, but were still covered by some gum in the back, as well as a very small amount of jaw bone. This would cause some of the nastiest and most painful infections that would plague me for a week or better at times. I made appointments with two different oral surgeons over the past few years to see about getting them out, but heard horror stories about one of them from several trusted sources, as well as he only saw me for two minutes, said "you''l be fine" and walked out and the other did not accept insurance and was a long wait to get into. I either wanted to do it right away, or not at all.

So I forgot about it for a while until the next infection. I heard about a fantastic oral surgeon in the area where I had started my new job several months earlier from several coworkers. I made an appointment to see her for a consult and was pleasantly surprised. She was caring and listened to me, she actually stayed with me and answered every question I had, which took about an hour. I was impressed, so I scheduled the extraction for about a month and a half later. After several sleepless nights, countless hours of seeking out wisdom teeth extraction accounts online and so on, I called back and rescheduled the appointment for a week later, to get it over with. I decided with the oral surgeon that since one of my fears was being messed up from being put under and being sick afterward, that we would go with a valium before the appointment and nitrous during the appointment.

I obsessed over the next week and read everything I could online, called the oral surgeon back with more questions, which she graciously answered, lost sleep, cornered everyone I knew to ask about their experiences, etc. Finally, the day came. I had thought of nothing else. I actually cried as I got into the car with my boyfriend (valium hadn't quite kicked in yet). Once the valium kicked in, I felt giggly and sort of drunk, much happier. I talked my boyfriend's ear off the entire 45 minute ride to the oral surgeon's. When we got there, I signed the consent form no problem and waited maybe 5 minutes for the dental assistant to come and get me. She had me sit in the surgery chair and that's when it hit me. "OH GOOD LORD, THIS IS REALLY HAPPENING! OH GOD!" I told the assistant how scared I was about this and she asked me what specifically was scaring me about it. I told her that I was terrified of gagging during the procedure and from the gauze after, I was terrified of pain during and after the procedure, I was scared that the nitrous wouldn't work, and was just feeling like it was going to be like medieval torture to be in the chair and having this done. She was extremely reassuring and stayed there with me the whole time.

When the oral surgeon came in, she was extremely reassuring as well. She said that we would take things at my pace, if I needed them to stop or if something hurt, just raising my hand or saw "ow" or "stop". The started the nitrous, which helped a little, but not so much that I was unaware of what was going on or anything. She then gave me several shots of lidocaine, all over the back of my mouth. These did hurt a little, but were over so fast I didn't even have time to be upset about it. They talked to me about funny stories about their kids, pets, husbands for a few minutes, which got me giggling, and gave the lidocaine a chance to really take effect.

The dental assistant graciously offered to hold my hand, which was a HUGE comfort to me. They told me that I could listen to my MP3 player that I brought if I wanted to, but I wanted them to talk me through the entire procedure. The oral surgeon started by putting small, rubber bite block in my mouth, and explained absolutely everything she was doing as she was doing, as well as what I would feel. I shut my eyes because I did not want to see the tools or the reflection of my mouth in the oral surgeon's glasses. It did feel very strange to me, which she said it would. I squeezed the assistant's hand like there was no tomorrow. The first two teeth came out quite quickly, to my surprise, then one of the top teeth wasn't numb when she started to work on it, so I said "ow" and she stopped immediatly and said "I'm glad you told me, we're going to take right care of that right now". She shot me with some more lidocaine, and went to work on the last bottom tooth while the top numbed. Before I knew it, all four were out, including a couple of dissolvable stitches on the bottom two, and all in about 45 minutes. They gently added gauze to my mouth and gave me oxygen for a few minutes. They brought my boyfriend in and gave him and I aftercare instructions. My boyfriend had two bags of frozen peas and my prescriptions for Ibuprofen 800mg, Clindomycin and Percocet in the car already.

I began icing my face as soon as I got in the car and did this religiously (20 minutes on, 10 off) for 10 hours after surgery, until bedtime. I slept through the night and have been icing religiously again this morning (20 on, 10 off) and will continue until the 24 hour mark. At this point, I have almost no swelling at all.

I only changed the gauze once, the bleeding stopped after about 2 hours. The numbness wore off after about 2-3 hours as well. The first thing I felt was mild pain, more like an aching soreness (in other words, not unbearable) in the areas where the wisdoms were. I took an Ibuprofen 800mg, which took about 20 minutes to kick in and took right care of the soreness. I have been continuing the use of the Ibuprofen every 8 hours so far. I have not even touched the Percocet, haven't needed to.

I chose not to brush my teeth last night, but rather wait until it has been 24 hours since surgery.

I was able to eat a homemade smoothie, a yogurt and some applesauce yesterday. I had yogurt, a soy milk protein shake and a fruit/veggie smoothie so far today, not feeling deprived or anything either. I also made myself some homemade iced tea, with nothing in it but tea. This tasted better right after my surgery, as with drinking water, I was tasting too much blood.

All in all, I am so glad I did it and so glad it is over. I think one of my biggest motivators was thinking back to last summer, just after I had had a particularly bad infection. I scheduled an appointment of have them out a week later in July. I was taking a two day course to get my motorcycle license a week before hand and all I thought about during the entire course, was my stupid wisdom teeth extraction appointment and how scared I was. I also chickened out of that appointment. This time around I figured that I do not want to waste one more fun thing in my life worrying about stupid wisdom teeth that take less than an hour to remove and should be fairly well healed at least within a week. It is such a short time to go through, to be able to enjoy the rest of one's life without ever worrying about it again.

So for those of you about to undergo this, or thinking about undergoing it, take heart. It is so quick and you are in control of the situation. If you are not, go to a different dentist or oral surgeon. Listen to aftercare instructions and follow them closely. You will be okay, you will survive this and you will be so darn proud of yourself for being so brave and guess what? You will never, ever, ever have to think about you wisdom teeth again!

Best of luck! You can do it! :):);D:thumbsup::yay::jump::whistle::cloud9::cheers:
 
Well done!!

Isn't it an amazing feeling that it is now all over, you should be very proud of yourself ......

:)
 
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