My medical leave appears to be over. It was good while it lasted though and I will forever look back on my wisdom teeth removal as a positive experience and one of my favorite vacations ever.
I feel like my teeth had a good run with me. They got to stick around longer than most everyone else’s wisdom teeth and on their last night with me, I even got them a special little treat. Kind of like a prisoner on death row’s last meal. My teeth got a big ol’ slice of apple pie in the last hours that I could still eat. I guess that was my way of saying no hard feelings.
The morning of the great removal felt very reminiscent of those 3 mornings that were the preludes to my children’s births. All 3 mornings, I wondered if I should go ahead and take a shower, because there would probably be pictures. Each morning, I had nervous uneasiness as I knew I was headed to something good, yet a little apprehensive at having something removed from my body that had pretty much taken root in there……even if in the case of my children, my own body was by this time working very hard to expel this little something. And just like all the other mornings, Brandon was uncharacteristically giddy during our drive. I would guess that the whole having another child was behind his behaviour all the other times and this time, it was the excitement of getting to see me act like a fool while heavily sedated.
We arrived at Dr. Gerard’s office, where I was greeted by an absolutely lovely receptionist who called me Darlin’ each time she spoke to me. She also asked me if I needed a note for school, which I absolutely loved. She was very quick to apologize to me, saying it was just habit…..but it was too late, I went ahead and took that could-have-been-a-compliment-could-have-not and made it the nicest thing anyone had said to me all day. I almost took her up on that note just so I could say to people, “Look, look everyone at how young someone mistook me for.”
I wonder if I can go back and get that note?
Then it was time, a very nice and even handsome older man with a much older assistant came to let me know my presence was needed. This is where I would like to point out that I was not yet under any sort of medication and this doctor’s name tag clearly said Dr. McCuller. I had been referred to a Dr. Gerard and had called and made my appointment with him specifically. His name was even on the outside of the office. But yet it was nowhere inside the office and this guy was not him either. And by the looks and sounds of things, Dr. McCuller and his assistant had been at this for quite some time and nothing was ever in said about another doctor. I don’t know that I will ever know who Dr. Gerard is or if there even is a Dr. Gerard.
Whatever…..
My new doctor took his time telling Brandon and I both what we were to expect and what each of our specific jobs were to be with this whole undertaking. Mine were to make sure and take my pain meds immediately upon feeling less than fantastic and not to touch my gauze for at least 3-4 hours. I listened intently to Brandon’s list of duties as well, so that I could make sure and tell him if he hadn’t caught something…….but all of my listening didn’t really matter because I didn’t remember anything anyway.
After Brandon was whisked away to the waiting room, Dr. McCuller and I had a nice little chat about how getting your wisdom teeth out, in his opinion, is not a surgery you should have done and have your significant other bring you to if you haven’t been together for a while. He let me know that many a relationship has been messed up because int he blurry moments after a patient “wakes up” sometimes things are said out loud that maybe shouldn’t be. Also, he let me know in a very kind manner that it was pretty much next to impossible to look pretty after oral surgery. This would be an ugly day for sure for me. Thank you Dr. McCuller for making sure Brandon was already committed to me before uglying me up.
We talked about kids, how he was a big meanie for putting the stingy, burning venom in my arm and how assistant was going to be reaching under my blouse to put on a heart monitor……
I never found out for sure if Ms. Assistant put her hand and a heart monitor down my top because the drugs kicked in about then.
My next memories are being ushered out of the top-secret exit and assuring everyone that I could walk just fine as I proceeded to have a seat on the ground. I am not a particularly large woman, but I think I called for all hands on deck to get me out to the car. I can’t be for sure, but from what I hear, I am pretty sure that I tried my hardest to walk by myself even though I was completely incapable of any such thing. There was a lot of collapsing and swaying and some pretty intense clinging going on. I also recall being very concerned about not having received my complimentary t-shirt. At no point had I ever been promised a t-shirt upon the removal of my teeth. But I guess after everything was all said and done, in my sloshed up mind, I felt I deserved one and really wasn’t in a big hurry to leave until I got mine.
On the way home, I also confirmed to Brandon several times that I wasn’t the least bit tired, all while having my eyes tightly shut. There was also the moment where I rather calmly “discovered” that they had actually pulled out my front teeth. It was really my giant, numb bottom lip that I was feeling but I was pretty convinced that a mistake had been made and Dr. McCuller had wrongly taken my two front teeth. But the best part was that I wasn’t the least bit upset about it, just confused.
I think the best part of my spectacle was when we came home and Brandon tried to take me upstairs. When I just let go of all handrails and fell back on him, insisting that he “wheelbarrow” me up the stairs. That is a term that Reese and I use when he leans back on me and I hold his shoulders like the handles of a wheelbarrow as he walks up the stairs. Unfortunately, Brandon wasn’t familiar with this term. It’s a good thing I’m not a bigger woman than I am or I probably would have taken out the both of us, as well as the stairs, and possibly the glass front door.
Once in my room….I was left alone and slept the day away.
And it was beautiful.
A few more highlights of my weekend would be at the point Friday night when I began to fear that I was going to die of Toxic Shock Syndrome. For any one you boys out there that might be reading this, I won’t explain it all too you but I think all of you ladies have read the little pamphlets that come in the tampon boxes. The literature that puts a fear in you that if you accidentally leave this device in your body for a minute too long, you shall surely die and it will be a terribly embarrassing death because no one has ever heard of that actually happening. But by the size that my mouth crater gauze was growing, I was pretty sure that it had absorbed at least half of my body-weight in fluids and I was gonna be that one person who tampon box pamphlets were written about. Only it would be mouth gauze and I would want everyone to know that detail.
The gauze had to go
And let me tell you friends, I am pretty protective of my mouth and there has not been a whole lot of nastiness in there before, but that gauze was by far the most disgusting thing that I have ever seen come out of me.
The rest of the weekend went well. I was allowed to rest and had my hubby and papa here to look after things. I even got to miss out on Mattie’s field day at school and spent most of Sunday curled up in a ball on the couch, slipping in and out of consciousness.
And then it happened. A moment that brought me to my knees and tested my trust in Brandon pretty much more than anything else ever has.
I got a tiny piece of cole slaw trapped in the clotting reservoir and try as I may with my tongue, I could not free it. Not only was I getting myself completely disgusted and on the brink of certain vomit with every searching sweep my tongue made in that abyss, but I was getting more and more frightened that if I didn’t get the cabbage out, it would lodge in there and start to rot and I would get some sort of flesh-eating disease.
the tears were coming and the panic was already deeply set in my voice when I dropped to my knees in front of B and asked to please, PLEASE see if he could see if and get it out. I would like to say that if he had asked me to do the same, I love him deeply but there is no way. My husband has a stronger stomach than I though and bravely took hold of the table light and shined it into my mouth, spotting the fugitive. I asked him to get in out , but his finger was too big. “Don’t use a q-tip” I yelled. “It will pull on my clot!” He scurried off the couch and came back holding a toothpick. “Not that!” I am pretty sure I cried. “TRust me, I’m a doctor!” he assured me as he also dropped the toothpick on the floor.
And then I sat there, holding as still as possible, readying myself for the surging pain I expected at any moment, as Brandon poked around trying to ease the foreign body out of my cesspool-like caverns. And then it was out….he had done it.
I have to say, I was pretty proud of him and I think he thought he was pretty awesome,too.
And then about 15 minutes later I did it again.
I will not be eating coleslaw or anything else that is in tiny pieces for at least 2 months because our marriage can’t handle that much excitement and life or death drama. Also, Brandon isn’t around most of the time and there is no way I am trusting Reese with a toothpick.
All of that said, I hope Mattie appreciates what I have done for her. For weeks now, she has come home on Fridays sad because she doesn’t think the boys at school (which make up the bulk of her class) think she brings cool things for Show and Tell. But this week, sister gets to take 4 of her mother’s molars and I don’t think anyone is going to come up with anything better than that…….at least not in a week.
Mattie, you’re welcome.
And Brandon, thank you for rescuing me.
Mama Tried 