Then I Took Down the Christmas Tree

The Saturday after Christmas (so December 26) I woke up in the middle of the night with jaw pain.

I’ve had fairly regular pain since August (September? Hell, I don’t know.) which is when I got four fillings in three corners of my stupid mouth. Remember that trip to the sketchy farm with the one-footed chicken? My jaw hurt then and it was about a week after my fillings.

So. I didn’t think much of it. I just took a couple of aspirin (ibuprofen, whatever, Jan) and went about my business.

But this time, the pain didn’t actually go away. It stuck around and got worse.

I muddled through the weekend and made my way to work on Monday and Tuesday. The pain wasn’t constant but it was definitely building. It was all along my lower left jaw and making its way toward my ear.

On Tuesday night around midnight, I got up and found some stronger pain meds, which helped me sleep. I decided I’d call the dentist the next day to see if they could fit me in and figure out what was going on.

At 6:30 the next morning I took another dose of the strong pain meds and went to work.

By the time I got to work, I was sick to my stomach. My jaw didn’t hurt as much, though. So…lose/win?

I went outside at 8:04 to call the dentist. I thought maybe being outside in the cold January air would help my nausea.

The dentist office was able to get me in at 8:30 that day. Yay?

The appointment took maybe seven minutes and cost $94 for the dentist to tell me I needed a root canal in my lower back molar. I’ve never had a root canal before so that was a daunting prospect.

Because this tooth is the farthest one back, the dentist gave me referrals to two endodontists. You know what means, right? It’s going to cost more! Yay specialists.

The dentist also gave me a prescription for antibiotics and strong pain meds (read: narcotics.) I went to Walmart to get these prescriptions filled. Check your local listings but the Walmart pharmacy in my area doesn’t open until 9:00am. I was at least 10 minutes early since my dentist appointment took less than twenty seconds and cost almost a hundred dollars.

Alas, the air inside Walmart isn’t as refreshing as the frigid January air in northeastern Indiana. So… I wanted around Walmart for five minutes and then had to make my leisurely way back to the restrooms because, hello narcotics on an empty stomach.

I’d been guzzling water all morning because I knew this was going to happen. Thank you eleventy million weeks of morning sickness.

I made it to the restroom and wouldn’t you know it? The only stall open was the middle one.

You know what’s grosser than throwing up in a Walmart bathroom? Throwing up in the middle stall of a Walmart bathroom while the ladies in the stalls on BOTH sides of you are taking massive dumps. There I was, yacking up all the water I’d drunk that morning and on both sides of me, BOTH, were the sounds of women shitting.

It was horrible as it sounds.

I cleaned myself up (physically, emotionally, I’m not sure I’ll ever feel clean again) and went to find the pharmacy open for business.

I didn’t get back to work until almost 10 that morning. I walked in and my boss, bless her, took one look at me and told me to go home. She also told me to take the next day, New Year’s Eve, off; which gave me a four and a half day weekend. Too bad I felt so bad, we could have partied hard.

Hahahaha. That’s funny.

I should have called the endodontist that day when I got home. Alas, instead I slept off and on in the heated recliner and wasted an entire day mourning my life choices.

I did call the next day, which was a Thursday for those not paying attention.

I called the place that had an office that has a twenty-nine minute drive from my office. They also have office that is a fifty-five minute drive from my office. This is pertinent information that will come into play later. The second endodontist has an office that is halfway between the two offices of the first endodontist, which is about a 35 minute drive from work.

The office that is closest to work only does the procedure I needed on Thursdays. They had an opening for a week later, on January 7, at 12:40. Did I want that appointment?

What do you think?

I took the appointment and prepared to suffer for seven more days. Oh, woe is me, I’m such a freaking martyr.

I figured out that taking a full pain pill every six hours was torture. But if I took half a pill every five hours, I got just enough pain relief to be semi-productive. By semi-productive I mean I was able to get laundry done, wash dishes as needed and cook food so that my family didn’t starve. But the vacuuming did not get done, the kitchen did not get swept, and I think Olivia might have been extra stinky because baths were not a priority unless they were my baths as I attempted to wash away my misery.

I managed to get through Monday and Tuesday at work but Wednesday brought the narcotic fog and residual pain in my stupid tooth.

I decided to go home early. As I was leaving work, my phone rang. It was the endodontist’s office. See, the closer office is actually in the same office as O’s orthodontist, who has offices in both Kendallville and Angola. We see him in the Angola office but have been to the Kendallville office once for Alyssa. So I knew where I was going to get my root canal. Except wait. No. There was a problem with the compressor at Dr. D’s office and so, if I wanted the root canal done the next day, I’d need to drive to the farther office, down on the south side of Fort Wayne. It could be at the same time, though. Yay.

Obviously, I acquiesced. What else was I going to do? Reschedule and suffer another week or more with the pain of the tooth and the awfulness that goes along with narcotics? No. I just couldn’t stare down another weekend of misery. So I accepted the appointment and went home

When I got home I went straight to bed where I slept soundly enough to dream for an hour and a half. As I wavered between sleep and waking, I felt someone leaning against the bed, as if they were leaning over me. I assumed it was Tom or Olivia and ignored them, pretending to be more asleep than I actually was. When I finally rolled over, no one was there.

Huh. Neither Tom nor Olivia will admit to coming up to see how I was doing. Alyssa said she locked my bedroom door to keep Liv out.

Double huh.

Finally, it was Thursday, January 7. I made it through the morning at work with not nausea because I didn’t take anything for pain that morning. I’m a slow learner, but I do learn. And guess what? I got to the appointment, got two extra shots of anesthetic (apparently, I’m a tough nut to numb) and then it was done. I was super numb but hey, that meant I wasn’t in pain.

When I got home that afternoon, I felt so much better I took down the Christmas tree.