Long in the tooth
My sister has just had one of her wisdom teeth out. She wrote about it on her blog, and my response (Just one? One wee wisdom tooth out? Pah, you know nothing of pain…) reminded me of my own torturous experience of dental extraction.
I hate going to the dentist. I think this comes from having a lifetime’s worth of bitter, emotionally shrivelled dental witches jab ruthlessly at my gums with instruments of torture and then tell me to stop being such a baby, while blood dribbles down my chin, and tears dribble down my cheeks. I was convinced that they had no empathy, sympathy, or other human feelings. Until a few years ago, dentists would be considered by me to be living definitions of a sociopaths.
Then I met the dentist who removed all my wisdom teeth. He was lovely – a gentle, Chinese man with a nice line in valium and a willingness to pander to my pathetic fear of his tray of tools.
He told me that, despite my horror of all things dentist, I should have the impacted teeth out under local anaesthetic, because the root was positioned in a way that it might sever the nerve in my jaw. I thought it over for about a week, and then, reluctantly, agreed that I could probably live with long term facial paralysis less easily than, say, a mere hour in the butcher’s chair.
It was horrific. I won’t go into it in detail, but it involved a lot of valium, a large needle, blood, sweat, tears, whimpering, moaning, a small saw, a pair of pliers, blood, bits of tooth flying all over the shop and some more blood. I was a shadow of my former self at the end of it, and on top of it all, I had to ask him for the teeth because my ex wanted to see how gory they were. (They were gory. He was pale.) When I left, he had to shut up shop early because no-one was left in the waiting room.
So, at this point in my life I was living in New Cross (immortalised by Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine). New Cross is a bit shit, but that’s beside the point. The point is that my dentist was in Putney. Now those of you not aware of what this means in terms of geography – London is big. New Cross is about as far east of south London as Putney is west. It’s a pain in the arse getting from one to the other by public transport, even when you’re healthy. When you’ve got a mouth full of bloody cotton wool and you’ve just started to feel the effects of the second valium the dentist felt obliged to give you, it’s next to impossible. So I got a taxi.
The taxi driver, so papery yellow and shrivelled he looked like he smoked 60 Bensons an hour, kindly picked me up outside the dentist’s office. I fell across the backseat, moaning gently. I had to write down where I wanted him to go.
“What’s wrong wiv ya, love?” he asked me, his smoker’s voice making him sound like a scary cockney gangster type person.
“Keef. Hag isgom keef ah. kain kerrigle.”
“Oh, that’s nuffing love. I remember when I ‘ad all me teef aht. Some geezer did me wiv a poker.”
He turned round, and smiled at me. Through the valium haze I could see that most of the teeth in the top of his jaw were missing.
“Uh.” I said. What do you say? “Gosh, how unfortunate, I’m dreadfully sorry. Why would he do such a thing?”?
I decided instead to pretend to go to sleep for the journey.
Very quietly asleep.
July 18th, 2007 at 6:21 pm
Actually, it wasn’t half as bad as I feared it was going to be. Having dosed me twice so that I didn’t feel a thing (and she very sneakily almost – yes ALMOST – got 1 injection in before I noticed) she noticed every squeak I made and always stopped instantly. She was a complete contradiction in terms – a NICE dentist. I wasn’t worried at all in her hands. Why she didn’t take the other one out, I don’t know. Perhaps the thought of having to double dose both sides of my mouth made her reconsider.
Unfortunately it won’t be her taking the other one out. It’s a guy called Neil. Nightmares abound.
July 18th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Oh and I took one look at the lump of tooth and bone in the massive pair of pliers waved in front of my face and decided that I could do without seeing that again, thank you very much!
July 18th, 2007 at 8:19 pm
Sounds wise, luv.
July 19th, 2007 at 12:44 am
I had all four wisdoms out in a dentist’s chair under local anaesthetic. Like you. I asked the dentist, before he started, why he didn’t do two and then two another time, which seemed to be how most people have it done. He replied “most people don’t want to come back again – it’s not a very pleasant experience – best to get it over with”. It was an honest answer, although not very reassuring at the time. Still, like you, I do feel it gives me a high and rather smug vantage point from which to sympathise with those who have them out less than 4 at a time, and/or under general anaesthetic.
July 19th, 2007 at 11:08 am
I have my grandmother’s diary written before she was married. In a life of unmitigating good works (teenage rampage? FORGET IT – no such thing in general then; and she was vicar’s daughter; going + chaperone to the odd dance in London was about it; and even then she only appeared to dance with aged uncles- and no, don’t take that the wrong way..) the high points were 1) the anniversaries of her confirmation 2) being taken to the dentist to have all her teeth out, as a nineteenth birthday present. Seems they thought it would save a lot of hassle for the rest of your life. I suppose they gave her some kind of anaesthetic. She was much too polite to give any of the horrid details….
July 19th, 2007 at 11:46 am
Hey Kermy, you’re right to be afraid. Dentists called Neil can only be evil. Mwahahahaha.
Good Woman – hello! I am very wise. Thank you!
Iota, I salute you. I had mine out two at a time, and that was bloody bad enough. This little tale is only the first two. The second time I think I went to another dimension, or forced one of my various personalities to undergo it, because I remember very little.
Grannyp, hi. That sounds awful. No teeth at 19? And anaesthetic in those days probably wasn’t as handy as it is now. I will stop complaining.
July 19th, 2007 at 1:23 pm
I recall having my top two wisdom teeth out about mid teens, under general, in a hospital. The surgeon didn’t appear to be much older than I, and was quite cute, so I was instantly nervous, thinking: ‘is it possible to maintain ones cool infront of a girl whilst out cold on the slab and she’s elbow-deep in your gaping maw?…..’ (mewsings of a young dog).
So she’s doing the ward rounds and has a good old poke around my top row. “No problem: we should have those wizzies out in a flash!” was the conclusion.
I am suddenly overcome with sadness at the loss. These things which have been lying dormant for years are just poking their little noses, mole-like through the surface, and just as they do, they’re gonna be ripped in an untimely fashion by the root. And to top it all – they already have a PET NAME!
Overall, it was probably a good idea to remove them. What I still feel for are a couple of perfectly good pre-molars that a rather keen dentist pulled because (in his opinion) my mouth would still be too full of teeth, even without the wizzies (sniff!). Like Posh Spice, I’m now self-concious of smiling too broardly, as there are two gaping holes between canines and 2nd pre-molars. Guess the grannyp article puts this into perspective a little – I ought not to feel too bad about it!
July 19th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
…and before you smash that one into the next county, that’s ‘musings’ (breathes sigh of narrow escape).
July 19th, 2007 at 1:55 pm
i went into a dentist in putney for a check-up, yes putney.. and yes the dentist was very handsome, and yes i foolishly agreed to the impacted wisdom teeth removal immediately, only 2 mind you, but i was back at vso by 10 and felt alright with it.. god knows how you’re going to get on with childbirth!!
July 19th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Gordon, I think that makes the score 1 set to love. No narrow escape with double faults…
Mel, I’m going to milk it for all I’m worth. With any luck, I won’t have to do anything for myself for approximately 2 years.
July 20th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
At the age of 17, I had my 4 wisdom teeth.
and I still have them now.
Can you be big mouthed and wise at the same time ?
August 27th, 2007 at 2:36 am
At least you were luckier with your taxi driver than I was when I had some teeth out.
After having some extractions done, I remember having to get a taxi back home, and the taxi driver was horrible with me.
Despite my bleeding gums, and having to sit on the back seat with a hanky in my mouth, he was so aggressive and unfriendly. It’s as if he just didn’t want me in his taxi and coudn’t wait to get rid of me.