The Root Canal

I've had a toothache off and on since December. I visited the dentist before my cruise in February in an attempt to avoid some sort of emergency procedure in the Dominican Republic.

His advice: Brush with sensitive toothpaste.

So I did. Thankfully there were no emergency procedures necessary on the trip (except the one to loosen the death-grip on the ice cream cone in my hand) but when the mini-tube of toothpaste he gave me was gone and the pain was not, I began to question his judgment.

I ignored it until a few weeks ago when the pain hit an all time high. My upper and lower jaw were throbbing constantly and there were nights when I contemplated removing the tooth myself. Since the dentist hadn't seen anything wrong before, I thought maybe it was all in my head - because that's a normal assumption. I finally decided to have him check it out again. He still was unsure that something was wrong, but sent me to a specialist anyway.

During my visit to the specialist, he did a cold test. He put something that he claimed was "super cold" against a normal tooth - I felt the pain immediately and it went away as soon as he removed it. He then touched the tooth in question. And held it there. And I felt nothing. They took another x-ray and when he came back into the room he said, “Yeah….Stephanie, your tooth is dead. And that extreme pain you were experiencing was its death.” Awesome.

So the date was set and today I went in for my first (and hopefully last) root canal. And I survived.

This is the face of a girl with a pain-free tooth.
I was a little nervous going into it, but I felt NOTHING. Not even the shot when he was numbing my mouth. It was actually more comfortable than most fillings I've had. My mouth was no longer numb after just a couple hours, there was no drooling involved and I'm as good as new!

The strangest part was the "rubber dam" they used. Essentially they poke the tooth they are working on through the rubber so all of the dust and whatnot stays on the outside and they don't have to keep suctioning out your mouth, etc.
Strange, but kind of brilliant.

The best part was hearing the Dr. use the words "homies" and "peeps" in a sentence to his assistant. Nothing like a little awkward white man to top off a root canal.