Following up immediately after the appointment—not great, not terrible.
Periodontist and dental hygienist were out, so I ended up with a third, new hygienist who I had to acclimatize to. Thankfully, there was a lot of time to do that, since the office called about my anxiety—apparently promptly noted in their records—and asked if it was easier to schedule me for one, four hour session on the 15th rather than two, two hour sessions between the 8th and 15th. After getting my whole mouth numbed, I can kind of see why they'd normally suggest splitting it into two sessions, but outside of that, things were pretty unremarkable.
The hygienist was very courteous, constantly asking me if I was okay, and reassuring me that things weren't all that bad, even when I mentioned that all that really bothered me were the needles—which again; not great, not terrible. Topical and good technique does wonders, and while I could kind of feel
some of the injections, it was like, 0-1 on a ten point scale with maybe a 2 at the worst—and this was over the whole mouth, so the fact I only felt maybe one or two minor 'tensions' at best was pretty good. I wouldn't want to go through it
again, mind, but it's not something that I would lose too much sleep over at the moment.
Actual SRP was as Gordon put it; lots of water, funny noises, and odd tastes. It's not a joyous experience, but local anesthetic does really reduce most of the experience to the tedium of sitting in a chair for a few hours—and even that goes faster than you'd think. After that, some classroom instruction on how to brush, floss, etc., and that was it for the office. Aftercare in my case is about eight days of antibiotics, no alcohol for twelve days, and to stay away from seeds, nuts, crisps, etc. for twenty. There's a little residual soreness as the anesthetic is wearing off, but it's mostly a dull feeling—like the day after streneous exercise where it sucks, but you can lay around and live with it—and that's before any of the OTC painkillers they recommend.
Slightly confused at office practices, since they booked my follow-up appointment in January—five months away—which as I understand, isn't common practice for this sort of thing, but eh, if it works? They said that they'd give a follow-up call on Monday to see how I'm doing, and I figure if there's a clerical error, they'll correct it at that time. Unfortunately, the periodontist rarely talks and the hygienists say conflicting statements, but this hygeniest was kindly enough to go over my x-rays and charts—a seven at worst, fives median, plentiful bone with relatively little loss—so generally an optimistic prognosis. Still don't know what the initial twelve that got me referred was about, and while they insistantly suggest wisdom teeth removal, it's more in a general caution of future issues rather than current ones—which I will defer to future me, since I am determined to keep them if they're not actively causing issues.
Anyway, to summarize—not great, not terrible! The thread has definitely shifted in theme, and I'll probably only follow-up if there's any radical change in situation, but as the hygienist said—no news is good news! Thank you everyone for letting me vent, and working through this with me! It's helped alleviate many,
many sleepless nights and runaway thoughts. Words cannot nearly express my immense gratitude!
crossed for you.
