What's wrong NOW? Does this ever end?

[MountainMama]

I was given a list of things to do/not do. Not pulling up the lip was to avoid pulling the stitches, so if your incision site is secure, you are probably okay.

I was told that the antibiotics were standard for the microsurgery, but my surgery was to get rid of infection, so I would say the antibiotics were mostly for that.

Is yours swelling at all now? If it is painful after not being painful, that seems like something is off. Maybe just a simple infection that antibiotics can clear up.

 

[Animalhouse]

Sometimes the body takes a while to respond to dental treatment. I had inflamed gums a few days after having work done but it went away on it's own after about a week. I would recommend salt water rinses and try to leave the area alone if you can.

 

[crysania]

It doesn't look swollen at all at this point. Here's what I can see...there's a distinct line that goes horizontal to my gum line. I suspect that's where the tissue was pulled back to. Above it is red. It looks LESS red today but it was very red on Saturday. Below it is kind of whitish. None of it looks really swollen. It just doesn't look like healthy gum tissue at this point and maybe it won't for awhile. No one gives you any idea of recovery time and what's normal.

If I take a lot of ibuprofen the pain is at least manageable. But mostly it feels like someone is scraping my gums with something that is constantly irritating. If I don't move my mouth at ALL it can sometimes go away. As soon as I talk it starts to hurt again.

 

[MountainMama]

I had the same flap surgery when the oral surgeon removed my extra wisdom tooth a month ago. The part that was the flap was whitish as well. I remember thinking it didn't look healthy, but I was at my doctor for a sinus infection and she took a peek at it and said it was normal and healing well. Mine didn't hurt as much at the incision site as it did kind of itch.

This time around, the incision site hurts worse. I still haven't looked at it, as it is still swollen and I don't want to disturb the stitches. I will say that I am on day 3 after my surgery and the pain is worse today. On my after care sheet, it does say that pain may "reappear" at around 5 days post surgery, and it is not a cause for concern unless it is accompanied by fever, swelling, or the pain is severe or it doesn't start to get better over the next few days.

Did you eat or drink something that might have irritated it? My endodontist told me to avoid spicy foods or foods that are more than "warm" temperature, plus avoid nuts or anything with hulls for a week.

 

[crysania]

That actually makes me feel a bit better that the pain may reappear. Weird! I did call the dentist's on-call on Saturday because I was concerned and he did say the pain can come back. It's not so much PAIN as it is just constant irritation. Like I said, as if someone is scraping at it with something.

It's possible I ate or drank something I shouldn't have. I was careful for a couple days and then got sick of it. I've been trying to be careful but I probably am not ALWAYS.

I go in tomorrow to have the stitches taken out (and maybe those are irritating something too) and he can take a look at it then. The pain didn't get worse after it started to hurt again. But boy is it disheartening when I had a day with almost no pain (Friday). I didn't take Ibuprofen for 24 hours and had only a tiny bit of pain that I could easily ignore. And then it came roaring back (day 4 after the procedure).

 

[MountainMama]

My endo did say also that the stitches can irritate when the skin is healing, so maybe it is that. She told me she uses dissolving stitches now, so I don't have to go back in, which is nice

 

[crysania]

In some ways I'm glad he doesn't use the dissolvable ones because it's an excuse to go back in and have him look at it!

The stitches could definitely be irritating my mouth. I'm looking forward to those coming out tomorrow and seeing what it's like after that heals.

I just hope this is all better in 3 weeks. I have rehearsals starting September 10!

 

[MountainMama]

Does it feel better now that the stitches are out? Mine are doing the same thing now...irritating me. Some have fallen out but the ones still in are really bugging me.

 

[crysania]

Oh gosh, I forgot to update!

Around late Sunday/Monday the pain started to dissipate. They told me to keep doing salt water rinses but GENTLY and so I did that. I noticed that the red part was less red and the white part was a bit splotchy.

I went Tuesday morning to get the stitches out and that was a relief. There was a little bit of soreness after they came out, but those parts are healing and they feel better now. The dentist said it's all healing up REALLY well and he liked how good it looked. He did tell me they did a LOT of work in there, maybe more than usual only because he wanted to make sure 100% that (a) I didn't have to come back and do it again and (b) that it would be smooth and non-irritating for playing my clarinet (I'm so glad I mentioned I was a wind instrumentalist!). So he said the pain I had wasn't unusual and since they did so much, he wasn't surprised the pain was a bit more than usual.

He suggested continuing the salt water rinses for the next week and to keep taking some ibuprofen. He expected a bit of pain for the next week but it should taper off.

And it HAS. Right now it feels more WEIRD than painful. Like I know it's healing but I'm not experiencing intense pain. So I really really hope this is it and I'm on the road to recovery. I have my first rehearsal in a little over 2 1/2 weeks, so I'm hoping I'm in good shape by then. The dentist thinks I will be.

 

[MountainMama]

That is great news!

 

[crysania]

I wish that I had anything good to report at this point.

The pain seemed to be diminishing. Then came back. Sometimes it feels ok, sometimes it feels pretty painful, like a toothache or something, sometimes just weird and achy. I don't know if I'm ever going to feel normal again. At this point I don't even know what to do or who to turn to or what could be wrong.

It'll have been 3 weeks since the last procedure where they shaved the bone, but I'm still on a lot of ibuprofen and even that doesn't take away all the pain. I go between thinking "maybe this is normal" to "I'm never ever going to play my clarinet again and this sucks."

I'm just so FRUSTRATED with this whole thing. It's been 5 months. When can I catch a break?