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Getting impacted wisdom teeth out after a bad experience, several questions and a short novel.

S

Saveme

Member
Joined
Jul 13, 2012
Messages
20
Location
USA
Hi everyone. I have been reading things on this site for a few days and I’m so happy that I found it because I feel a little less alone in my worries now. I’m kind of nervous about posting here because I'm worried that either my former or current dentist will stumble across it somehow and then I’d be really embarrassed! :redface: The following few paragraphs give a summary (as short as I could make it—I’m clearly bad a summarizing things) to give my questions some context, but you can just skip to the questions if you don’t want to read about my last experience. I tried not to go into much detail but it wasn't pleasant.

Anyway, I never had any dental fears until roughly 3 years ago when I got one of my wisdom teeth out (I’ve been lucky and never had any cavities or anything). Getting that tooth out was a horrible experience and I still have nightmares about it on occasion. I don’t want to post my big long story here (I have typed it out and might post it in journals or support later) but I do want to write a summary so you know what kind of fear I’m dealing with. Basically, getting the tooth out was bad enough because my dentist didn’t really seem to understand how nervous I was about the whole thing (I don’t deal well with medical things in general). He talked me into doing it with just locals and one tooth at a time when I would have preferred to get it all over with at once. It also took a long time, around an hour, and I was on the edge of panicking near the end. Then I got a dry socket. I didn’t know it until I went to get checked—it wasn’t so bad, just a dull ache and the occasional twinge that felt like a pulled muscle (I was taking my pain meds as prescribed though). However, the treatment for it was absolute torture. My dentist squirted some kind of paste into the socket, and it REALLY hurt—the best way I can describe it is to say it felt like he dug around in my raw socket with an electrified knife. My mouth felt better after that, almost normal again, but it wasn't worth that amount of pain. I was supposed to keep going back daily for a week to have that done, but I went one more time and then just couldn’t make myself go any more. I ended up changing dentists over this ordeal because my old one didn’t listen to me when I told him how scared I was and how I would prefer to be sedated and get them all done at once so it would be over and done with, and because he told me that the dry socket treatment wouldn’t hurt and then it was the worst pain of my life, and because even after I’d had such a bad time he still kept trying to get me to get the others out the same way, among a few other things that aren’t related to this experience.

My new dentist said I could wait about the wisdom teeth if I wanted to, and I was happy about that. Unfortunately, I got a mild gum infection related to my remaining lower wisdom tooth last week (it’s poking through the gum a bit) and he said I really should get at least that one out or it will just keep happening. I decided to get the top 2 out at the same time because they’re also bony impactions and he recommended that I get them out, and also so I won’t have to keep worrying if/when they might cause a problem too. This dentist offers IV sedation, which I will be getting. Now I’m really scared and have been crying and practically making myself and my poor family members sick over all this. My appointment is for the 19th. I really don’t want to do this, but I know I need to because I don’t want to keep getting infections (my gum is still sore) or worse. I told my dentist about my fear of dry socket treatment, and he said top extractions rarely get dry socket, but he could stitch up the bottom extraction site to help cut the risk of dry socket in it. He also said if I do end up with a dry socket, he could numb me up before treating it. That does make me feel better, but scares me too, because wouldn’t getting injections near a sore area in my mouth hurt pretty bad too?


--------------QUESTIONS (besides that one in the sentence above)---------

Will a dry socket heal if I do get one and choose not to get it treated? Is it really just the first 72 hours that you’re in danger of getting one? I’m probably going to be a nervous wreck that whole time period! :cry:

Could eating solid/regular food last time have caused the dry socket? My previous dentist advised me not to baby the area and to eat regularly right away, which was somewhat painful by itself!

I tend to sneeze a lot in the mornings. I’m not sure why, but it’s really more of a minor annoyance than something I usually worry about. Could repeated sneezing (sometimes as few as 4 or 5, but sometimes I sneeze quite a bit for the first half hour I’m up) cause me to get a dry socket? Would it be okay if I take some kind of medicine (probably an antihistamine which seems to help some, unless someone can suggest something better) every morning or could that cause the sockets not to heal or something awful like that? Is there anything I can try doing to stop myself from sneezing? Could sleeping while sitting mostly up (propped up on pillows) help?

What is having stitches in your mouth like? Do you think they’ll most likely be the dissolvable kind or will I probably need them removed? Does having stitches mean I won’t have a horrible gaping hole on that side for ages like I did last time?

My dentist thinks my whole surgery will only take about half an hour. My last one took around an hour for just one tooth and this is three. It took so long last time because I had hooked roots. Can you see hooked roots on x-rays, and is that likely not the case this time if it should only take around 30 minutes?

Does the fact that I have a small area of sore gum near my bottom wisdom tooth mean that it might not numb up properly, or should it be okay? My dentist didn’t put me on antibiotics or anything for it. I’m scared enough of the numbing injections even though I know I’ll have the IV (which is scary too) but I don’t want to feel anything else either. I seriously hope I don’t remember anything that happens at all! I wish they could just keep me out for two weeks so I could wake up well on my way to healing. :)

Would it be at all helpful to take vitamin c and/or iron for a few days before the surgery and for a while after? I’ve heard that vitamin c can help speed healing and I’ve heard that having low iron levels can slow healing. As far as I know my iron levels are okay (I don’t feel run down or have any other symptoms), but I am a vegetarian and don’t necessarily get a ton of iron in my diet.

I’ve heard that sometimes they can hit your sinuses while removing the upper wisdom teeth. Is that likely to happen? I really don’t want to have to have sinus surgery or anything as I’ve heard it’s very painful. :(

Sorry for the not-so-short summary and all the questions! I do plan to ask my dentist most of these things too, but I thought maybe some people on here could give me an idea of what to expect. Thanks so much everyone!
 
Hi :),

it's great that you've already got all your questions made out, maybe you could print out your post and use it to ask your dentist so you don't forget any of them?

I suspect your dentist was quite heavy-handed and had little concern for patient comfort :(. I suspect that with your new dentist, you will find the experience very different!

We have some information on healing after extractions and avoiding dry socket here:


If your sneezing in the morning is caused by an allergy, then antihistamines would be worth considering.

Not sure about the vitamin c but some people here have recommended pineapple juice and arnica cream to speed up healing (I suppose pineapple does contain a lot of Vitamin C, so...)

With your other questions, you might be best off to ask your dentist directly as he will have seen the x-rays and have a much better idea!! It does sound though as if he is expecting it to be easy and straightforward :).

Let us know what answers you get - they may also help other people who are reading your post! The chances that your current or former dentist may stumble across it are exceedingly slim (unless they're called Lincoln Hirst or Gordon Laurie :p)
 

Thank you so much for replying! I really hope things will be better this time too, I'm just really scared because of what happened before.

I'm glad to know that the vitamin c might not be a bad idea and that the antihistimines shouldn't be a problem. I'm not really sure if the sneezing is an allergy or not since it only happens in the morning, but it probably is because those types of medicines do seem to help a bit. Thank you for the link on healing too. I'm probably going to print a lot of that out.

I have an appointment for a cleaning and pre-op thing on Tuesday, so I will try to ask my dentist the questions then. I just get really nervous being there and feel kind of silly asking too much, but I think bringing a list in with me is a good idea. I'll be sure to post here with whatever answers I get.

If anyone else happens to have any answers/ideas/thoughts I'd still be really happy to hear them!

Thanks again. :)
 
Re: Getting impacted wisdom teeth out after a bad experience, several questions and a short novel.

I just thought I'd post my dentist's answers to my questions. I felt better about the whole thing while sitting there talking to him yesterday, but now I'm nervous again because I keep thinking of new things to be scared about! :(

He said not to worry too much about the sneezing as it is unlikely to cause a problem, but I can take antihistimines if I want.

He said I'll have stitches that dissolve. I'm still not sure what that will be like, but at least I won't have to go get them out.

He said that he does expect the surgery to take only about 30 minutes and it doesn't look like I have hooked roots on these teeth, but the bottom one is a little bit curved. He did mention the sinus thing, but said it usually heals on its own (but if not, the surgery for it is basically just sewing the hole closed). He said it's not likely to happen, but I'm still worried about it and really hope that it won't happen!

I'm also still worried about the IV medicine not working and feeling things during the surgery, but hopefully that won't happen. Being awake but not remembering or caring about what is going on around you sounds like such a strange concept that I don't really understand how it can be true. I guess it's one of those things that you can only really understand once you've experienced it! I hope it works and everything goes by quickly and painlessly from my point of view.

I am going to try my best to have a good day today, quit thinking about tomorrow and go do something fun. :) My appointment is bright and early in the morning, so if I don't reply here again today, I will let everyone know how it goes when I am able (they said I might sleep for some time tomorrow). I hope everyone has a good day today!
 
Great to hear that your dentist was able to answer your questions, and thanks for sharing the answers here :).

Wishing you a great experience with the IV medicine - there are lots and lots of success stories on this forum about IV sedation, so it must be true (and most people doubt it will work for them beforehand if they've never tried it before!).

Best of luck for tomorrow :hug5: and let us know how you got on!
 

Wishing you a great experience with the IV medicine - there are lots and lots of success stories on this forum about IV sedation, so it must be true (and most people doubt it will work for them beforehand if they've never tried it before!)

Just wanted to add that I have had IV twice and the first time it worked so well I had no memory of the whole procedure so I even doubted it would work the second time! Well no need for doubt and worry because IV is great. I got 4 wisdom teeth out in less than an hour (including the IV and numbing) and it was probably my favourite dental experience (because its the one I remember the least of and I got to eat ice cream for a week after!). If it wern't for terrible dentists like your previous one i'm sure it wouldn't have a bad reputation at all!

Don't worry about the sneezing thing, I was really scared too but being in the house recovereing my allergies were pretty good so it wasn't a problem. I didn't get stitches in my uppers and they felt fine within a week! Good luck
 
Thanks so much for your stories and support everyone! My surgery went really well, and while I'm still worried about the next few days, I also feel much better because now the surgery is over with! :)

I have a thread going under the support area where I detailed my experience, so I thought I would just post a link to that rather than re-post the same thing again here. Here's the link:


Thanks again!
 
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