Jaw breaker update

Back in April I had a dental disaster that has resulted in a dozen trips to the dentist and oral surgeon for: a bone biopsy; two root canals; three crowns; lengthening of an existing crown; five fillings; three deep cleanings; and the latest and greatest, a gum flap removal and abscessed bone extraction (the mold caused the abscess to grow & eat away part of my jawbone).


I find joy in knowing I'm putting my dental teams' children through college.

All the dental hulabaloo happened right before I was originally supposed to have all the medical tests I had last week and has been a damper on that moving forward the past few months. Finally, my mouth was healed enough that we could moved forward with the tests, before diving back into the oral ordeal, which is what I had the pleasure of doing today.

I still have at least two more appointments and then, FINALLY, I will be fitted for my new mouthguard and done with this entire ordeal.

Yesterday was the gum/bone extraction to rid the decayed section caused by my jaw being infected.


(You can right click, "open in a new tab" to read it)

So I was originally told that they would only be taking out a small section of gum, and possibly part of a tooth (I should know by now nothing's ever easy) but they ended up taking more gum than expected once they got in there. They also decided to take out a piece of bone between/around the two affected teeth, too. Which I was thrilled about, of course.

Fun times

This is my mouth after, with cement over the affected area to keep the stitches in place and the wound clean (this later proved to be a false security).



I made it through all the tests last week without pain meds, but when they're sawing a chunk of your jaw out, you bet your gold fillings, your hand's out when they offer drugs. I swam through the rest of yesterday in utter bliss.

Then today my mouth kept bleeding and bleeding and bleeding so I had to go back in. Apparently I'd ground the cement in my sleep in a way that it had popped a stitch. (No surprise there) They put in a few more stitches and more cement, gave me another pain pill and sent me on my merry way.

Only this time, when I got home I didn't immediately get in bed and stay there for 16 hours like yesterday (big mistake), but instead decided to eat some cantaloupe (big mistake #2) and stand around for no good reason (mistake trifecta). This boded well for me when I projectile vomited all over the white rug.

I was supposed to have more bloodwork done today but obviously if you're bleeding and barfing it can't happen, so it might happen tomorrow.


"To a person with a toothache, even if the world is tottering, there is nothing more important than a visit to a dentist."
-George Bernard Shaw



I have my summit meeting with the whole medical team tomorrow to go over all of last week's results! *Fingers crossed*