Thought I'd finish up the story, or at least enter the next chapter here...
Prior to showing up at the office they gave me a
Halcion to take. I've never taken a tranquilizer before, so it was interesting. Made me a little sleepy but otherwise I felt OK. Might just have been sleepy from the fact that the kids aren't sleeping too well lately either... But I think it did reduce my anxiety when I got there. Didn't care that they had to stick me in 3 different places before they got an IV going, just smiled and tried to make the girl know she wasn't really hurting me. Then as I was dozing there the doc came in and mentioned that they had given me
Versed and I commented that they hadn't given me anything yet, just the halcion, he said he had just injected it into the IV. That is the last thing I remember until after the procedure. Evidently it's a very powerful memory suppressor. I dont remember anything after that at all until my wife was tucking me into bed at home. I can almost remember commenting to her that I was kind of cross eyed while we were riding home. The rest of that first day all I remember really is being generally uncomfortable and her waking me up at intervals to hand out pills.
By the third day the swelling for the teeth sockets was going down and I was off anything more substantial than prescription dose ibuprofen. Unfortunately I am one of those people that for no reason apparent to anybody is prone to canker sores, and they were beginning to blossom all over my gums around where they had worked by this time. So on the 4th and 5th days I was back to taking high powered pain meds to survive that. I get one or two quite frequently and they are a minor annoyance, but this was (and still is) a very impressive display and they take several days to reach their worst and then several more days to start to heal. So it was very depressing to think that all those poor abused swollen tissues in there were now covered in ulcerated lesions. Ouch doesn't quite describe my feelings.
So that brings us up to today. I think today I came over the hump with those too and things start to improve again. But JEEZE those things hurt. Not for the squeamish are the links on wikipedia
here
But since I last dug up any info on this 2 separate treatments that actually do something besides numb them have become available. The one I just tried today was called "debacterol" and is basically sulphuric acid. Thats right, a chemical cauterie (which I plan to use as a band name someday...) and it actually seemed to work. I got the prescription today and actually got up the nerve to put sulphuric acid onto an open sore. I did numb it with some benzocaine first as much as possible which I highly recommend first. the documentation that comes with the stuff says that you will experience a "stinging" sensation. they put "stinging" in quotes
I was smart to do some numbing first as stinging didn't quite do the sensation justice. But after that it was just not painful anymore. really quite neat. The second area I applied it to was much larger and is not completely numb now, but has changed from a sharp agony to a dull ache, so I'll take that any day. I am waiting for my wife to get home to hold the flashlight for me so I can hit the last big bit of nasty with it.
Now there is also a creme product called aphthasol which I'm also going to get ahold of to try out. My whole life you just look sideways at my gums and they erupt into painful sores and now there are finally things to do about it!
Now if the tooth holes just continue to heal I might survive this.
No bad side effects from the anesthesia that I could note. Felt kind of like I had a cold the second day, but that wore off and then I was only concerned with the fact that the pain was keeping me awake and miserable. But otherwise it was a non-issue, which is good.
