Root Canal and ramblings……

Yeah, so I finally got up the guts to go through with this root canal. I think I canceled it twice, and made excuses for a year or so, then I had to get braces put back on my teeth because I was naughty and didn’t wear my retainer at night……well really I lost it while on vacation and then just totally forgot about it. Out of sight out of mind. So the braces held the root canal off for another 9 months. When I was in for my last cleaning, they hog tied me and sucked my spit and blew air in my mouth until I cried UNCLE and made an appointment…..fer this gal-darn woot thanal.

PAUSE: If you have had a root canal, you know they are really not that bad. It’s just me. It’s me being scared of possible torture, and then the fact that I just can’t stand to sit still, in a dentist chair, for 90 minutes, it cramps my style in more ways than you know. Resume rambling……

I subconsciously forgot to write this appointment in on my calendar….if I had an iPhone then I could do it all immediately from that device and sync it to my computer, but for now I’m stuck with the paper calendar hanging on a nail from the cupboard, which I frequently forget to write things in…and sometimes when I do it’s a pain because the ink doesn’t want to write cause my pen is virtually upside down while writing……..SO back to my forgetting to write it on the calendar. I knew I had scheduled it in May sometime after the departure of our house guests. I called my dentist office on Monday hoping it was a couple weeks out so I would have time to make an excuse and reschedule with out being a total annoyance to the scheduler.

MY PHONE CALL: me “Good Morning! How are you this morning? This is Sheila Johnson…Hey I was wondering….cause I kinda forgot to write it on my calendar…..um….when is that root canal I scheduled?” them….a little too quickly “We are looking forward to seeing you 9 am THIS Thursday morning!” the looking forward to seeing you made me feel guilty about potentially wanting to break our date and then the speed of the answer made me wonder if they had been waiting for my call. Hmmmmm….they probably have had big lime green post-it notes all over the break room and on every computer screen SHEILA JOHNSON MAY 12, 9AM DON’T LET HER CANCEL!!! me “Oh great! I will see you then”. Hang up, GASP, pant…..grumble “criminy” under my breath….UGH! I was just gonna have to suck it up and get it over with.

This was the morning. The root canal morning. All week long my kids kept asking me about Thursday…”can we do this that or the other thing?”, and my dramatic reply was “that’s the day of my ROOT CANAL!”. Like I was having heart surgery or something. I know I’m a kook. Now it’s only two hours later, the worst part is over, and I am wondering what the HECK I was being such a drama queen about. I am still numb, however. Maybe by the time I get done with my rambling…if you are still with me I will tell you different.

So this is how it all went down….I arrive. They don’t even let me get comfy in the waiting room…they take me right back, and seat me in a comfy chair, legs up, head rest….one of those posturepedic types. First they take a mold of my tooth area to make the temporary and eventually my new permanent toof. Then the dental girl (sorry I know there is a more technical term, but that’s what I call her), Kristin, she’s super sweet, shoves a whole lottah cotton soaked in numbing medicine back in the lower, right corner of my mouf. That gets to stay there for a few minutes while she gets me all hooked up with my bib and suctions tools, and a chest full of other things of which I have no vocabulary for. The new thing this time was that I could have my very own iPod with Pandora and headphones to jam out during my procedure, then of course the cool sunglasses. I was lookin’ smokin’ HOT! Why I didn’t have Kristin take a picture is beyond me…I know you would have loved to see me like this….as I would you.

Then entered my Dentist. Very nice man, with blindingly white toofs. Good thing I had my sun glasses on. After a little bit of small talk, he got right down to the business of “numbing me up”. The worst part by far. Thank goodness for the distractions of Pandora, and that my hair was caught between the chair and my dentists belly and was pulling rather hard, OUCH! After the shots they left me alone to let it all sink in.

Re-enter dentist, now I am numb, but wishing that I could also have the red Bozo Nose laughing gas too, just like when I was a kid, but I figure its too late to ask. He tips my chair way back. That’s when it happens….the post nasal drip.

PAUSE: In the Spring I always go through a period of nasal congestion and this irritating feeling of globs of glue running down the back of my throat. It usually does not bother me too badly, that is until I lay down…..

I feel it start to build, the snot glob, I try to calmly swallow, but then my tongue starts to whack out and convulse. Then I feel the hot rush of sweat from my armpits. None too soon comes the smell of burning flesh. UGHa! You know that smell of hair burning? (Don’t tell me you never yanked your hair out as a kid and burned it over your mothers favorite center piece candle.) So I open my eyes maybe I could make eye contact, but I have dark sunglasses on….all I see is my tooth particles flying in the air before my eyes like gnats in the night. I attempt to take a deep cleansing breath through my nose, which only further assits the snot glob farther down my throat….I wonder can they see snot globs sliding down peoples throats as they work. And If they can why don’t they take that sucker thing and just suck it right outta there? I would have really appreciated that. I guess I could have put my hand up like they said I should if I was in need, but my fingers were clinging so tightly to the armrests that I forgot I even had arms. SNORK! Oh my! Did I really just gag-snore? I was trying to avoid that loud SNORK sound, but my body was out of control. I opened my eyes again, it was like it never happened, no one even cracked a smile. Are you joking…if I were a dentist and someone SNORKED that loud while I was drilling the ba-geebies out of their mouth, I would have at least given them a little crooked smile….like whoops, those things happen. Instead I SNORK and I’m left laying there wondering….did I really just SNORK loudly, and then gag myself or was it all apart of my very vivid imagination.

ZZZzzzzzzziiinggg…zzzzzzzzzzzwwwwheeeee zzzzzweeeee-weeeee-wweee=weee a few more zings and loud whizzes and my dentist was proclaiming he was all done. No mention of the gagging snort noise I made, no side ways glances at the dentist girl. Maybe I didn’t snork….I was too chicken to ask, and I was afraid to talk all numbed up. What’s more pathetic snorking loudly or snorking loudly and then asking about it when your mouth is numb and your tongue is hanging to the side like a dead deer. I decided it was best not to bring it up. I wonder if my dentist put in his notes: patient has heavy post nasal drip and snorks.

How was your last dental experience?

OK my tongue is starting to tingle, but my wips are still numbah.

In the words of Edith Ann…..”Thaths the troof, Pthhhhhhh!”