Shortly ago my wisdom teeth got yanked. Everything up until the dentist was wrenching them back and forth trying to remove them was deeply unpleasant.

In my youth the dentists had told me not to worry about them: they weren’t impacted and would erupt normally, so there was no need to arrange a removal. This was all well and good until the last few years, when they started crowding my back teeth a great deal and, I believe, causing me headaches. I started at a new dentist shortly after we moved over here and I asked if that was a good idea, and… they sort of blew me off. I didn’t like that office at all.

But being me, and having my particular medical anxieties, I didn’t get around to it again until recently. It became apparent that the issues they were causing weren’t going to improve on their own. I put in for an appointment with Erin’s current dentist to get their thoughts, and they agreed it was time for them to go. “I’ll send you to the guy I used to take one of my teeth out,” the dentist said. “He’s great, and yours won’t be difficult: probably be out in two minutes or so.”

After scheduling with the oral surgeon, and some back and forth on the x-rays, the day arrived (today!). They got me back in for an initial consult… and showed me x-rays that were definitely not me. Apparently there’s more than one person with my name that use my dentist. They took another, the dentists talked it out with me, and said hey you wanna do it today? Hell yes.

They got me in the back and started feeding me the laughing gas, and then gave me a few shots of novocaine or whatever. In spite of the gas this set off my normal medical panic, which alarmed them, but we got it under control and continued. They popped the gas back on and got to work.

This was an excessively weird sensation: I was completely awake and aware of what was going on in my mind, and then totally… not oblivious, but unconcerned and unfeeling to the outside world. I could hear the doc talking, giving instructions, and they registered, but… they didn’t register. “Turn more towards Lucy… ok good. You may feel some cracking or popping…”. But I didn’t. I could tell my skull was moving, and that was it. Otherwise I was sitting there marveling at the fact that I didn’t feel any sort of pain. I did feel it, though, and could hear it reverberating. I could hear fibers grinding as he yanked them. It was very strange.

And then suddenly “Ok, we’re done, don’t stand up yet.” And I sat up carefully and that was that. Suddenly there was a barrage of instructions for taking care of it all, I was handed a bag of goodies, and off I went so that Erin could drive me home.

The numbness in the mouth is juuuust starting to wear off, so we’ll see what this is like in an hour or so. I got a prescription for hydrocodone, but we’re going to try to avoid that if we can. We’ll see if I change my mind on that overnight.

Hm, I should have gotten a picture of my x-ray for this post. Oh well. The scariest part is over, and now I just have to live through some healing.