BEDA 17: The Dentist: The Penultimate Peril

Well folks, it's finally here. What you've all been waiting for: The Story of My Root Canal. Here it is. You asked for it and I'm giving it to you.

With no further ado, my story.

Here it is.

Are you comfortable? Do you need a pillow? A snack? No? Okay. Here we go.

I was sitting in the cinema with my good friends Claire and Nora enjoying the antics of the star-crossed lovers in Crazy, Stupid Love (Is there a comma in there? There should be.) when, at approximately 1:10 p.m., with perhaps twenty minutes left of the movie, I had to leave to go to the endodontist. I was not sure if I was actually getting a root canal today; I swear my dentist told me he was going to do some kind of sensitivity testing to see how close the cavity was to the nerve. The Dental Nurse took an x-ray (I don't know what good taking yet another x-ray of the SAME thing would do, but hey, their call) and the endodontist said that there was no way to tell just how deep the cavity was so he was going to take out a filling I already had in that tooth to see, and something about my tooth around the filling looking cracked. WHAT?! So they numbed me and got down to business.

Now, I'm warning you, this may get a little graphic, so if you are squeamish I would suggest averting your eyes.

The endodontist removed my filling and informed me that there was "a lot of drainage." What kind of drainage?! Are my brains falling out? I am guessing it was blood because whenever he moved his hand it looked like there was blood on his dental instrument. How the hell did blood get in there? My teeth are out to get me. Anyway, after removing my filling he said "Yeah, you definitely need a root canal," and that he's surprised I didn't have more of a toothache. Boy Mr. Dentist, you are quite the sweet talker. Seriously. Are you sure your wife won't share you?

And thus commenced the drilling of a hole into the recesses of my tooth. Some truly philosophical thoughts that entered my mind during that hour of rooting and canaling:

"Has anyone ever burped in a dentist's face?"
"If i don't cough I'm going to die. I never have to cough. Why now?"
"What if he drills too far into my head? Is he even using a drill?"
"It smells like Michael's. Are they hot gluing fake flowers into my teeth? I'm not paying for decoupage. This isn't arts 'n crafts."

But then I got pulled out of my delightful reverie when I noticed our dear Endodontist Friend pulling something out of my mouth with the dental equivalent of tweezers. At first I tried not to look because I knew it would creep me out. I looked. It creeped me out. I am really gross and the first thing I thought of was an abortion. (I'll understand if you no longer want to be friends with me after that sentence.) Eventually he started plugging up the hole he made it my tooth with some weird little things... I can't even come up with a comparison. Then he took the weird mouth guard thing I had in there and we all got some nice spit strings to join us in the little cubicle. They took yet another x-ray (this time I can understand why) and I got to see a before and after.

  Then the endodontist told me to rinse with salt water a couple times and that I'd have to go to my regular dentist to get a permanent filling or a crown (just one? both?  some clarification would be nice) as soon as possible otherwise the temporary filling they put in would fall out. APPARENTLY they just do the actual root canaling and then the dentist takes care of actually closing it. Awesome. So tomorrow at 9:30 I have to go back to the dentist (third time this week. what a joy) where they will hopefully permanently fill this canal in my tooth. I think I shall call it the Panama Canal. Oh wait that's taken. Darn it.

As I was leaving they were telling me that I should get it filled before four weeks and I am like, well I'm kind of leaving the state next week so, YEAH. This was a really hard concept for them to grasp. LEAVE THE STATE?! HOW COULD YOU?? Maybe they PLANTED the cavity to keep me here! Absolutely diabolical. But that's Arizona for you!

And there you have it. The thrilling tale of my Root Canal. Stay tuned for whatever fate awaits me at my return to the dentist tomorrow!

Days until I go back to Seattle: 6
Days until school starts: 12