Fair warning – may be getting into too much detail for some people.

TMI, DR: Basically, I’m fine. It’s just going to be some months before I’m healed.

So – for the rest of you – more gory details.

I had a tooth extracted last week. It was a back molar, the last tooth on a side. It had an ancient root canal in it. The organic part of the tooth had cracked. Lot of infection got in. It was pretty painful by the time I made it to the dentist.

The extraction itself went really smoothly. I think I spent as much time waiting to get numb as I did during the actual procedure. The dentist said that due to the infection, my body just wanted to get rid of the tooth, so it popped right out.

(And yes, that lovely scent/taste of decay that filled my mouth once the tooth had been pulled…)

I was on antibiotics before I went in for the extraction. I took them for seven days total. Luckily, I also ate a lot of yogurt and drank a lot of homemade kombucha so my system was back to normal within a couple of days of finishing the antibiotics.

Day six after the extraction, I feel something starting to poke up above the gum line in the extraction area. It said on my care sheet that I may have some bone extrusions, or even slivers of bone working their way out of my jaw.

Fine.

But by the next morning, it was a lot less fine. The extrusion had pulled all the skin to the side. Before my stitches had been nice and flat and on the top of my gums, in line with the rest of my teeth.

The extrusion pulled the skin so hard that the stitches had moved quite a bit, and were now on the inside of my gum. In addition, the skin had pulled apart, leaving a hole in what had been a smooth surface.

Rut-roh.

Called the dentist. They said it was fine.

About 2 PM that day, my tooth started to hurt. A lot. A dull, constant ache. That gave me a headache. Plus, I was grumpy.

Basically, I was teething. (snerk)

Went in the next day to have the stitches removed. The dentist laughed a lot at the teething joke, though I’m not, not really. He believes that the bone extrusion will not actually crown, but instead, will be reabsorbed by my body.

But there was no sign of infection, which had been my biggest concern, given the pain.

A couple of hours after he’d pulled the stitches, most of the pain went away.

However. Given the shape of my mouth, he’s afraid that the extraction site is really going to take a long time to heal – possibly in terms of months, not weeks.

*le sigh*

So I’m going to be chewing a lot on the other side of my mouth. Watching what I eat for a while. Going to be drinking smoothies instead of crunching my way through salads. Etc.

It will be fine. Will be making myself more soup to drink. And hey! Will probably lose more weight as well.