Dental issues, or, this is a thread in which you whine about the poor state of your mouth

Other than that, and a few dings my teeth are in pretty good nick, a few years ago I went to the dentist for the first time in 13 years and only needed 3 fillings.

Ah, but mine were fine too for the first seven post-dentist years... in year 8 I had my first bout of toothache since the 80s, and during year 9 I took to chewing on only one side of my mouth to avoid the pain. This is year 10. I'm too scared to go back.

(I'm sure some people would say the sound of my whiny voice in their ear is not unlike same.)

It was quite an experience. I just turned 25 so I guess it's time to start being responsible. He also wants to remove my wisdom teeth (they fit fine and don't hurt) because he says there's no way I can keep 'em clean and they'll just turn into dumpsters. I think I will choose to disagree with him on this point because I really hate the idea of having them out.

After the visit I went and bought 5 soft toothbrushes and two packs of unwaxed floss and a bottle of Listerine. Blood sucks. So does the smell of filling cement.

Also - use ACT at night. Flouride, doncha know.

and godspeed, gareth.

I'll have to second this. Admittedly I had a very easy removal -- nothing impacted, I was up and around the following day -- and YMMV and all. But they were hard to clean and on one tooth the gum line was pulling away drastically.

But then again I don't notice teeth nearly as much as I used to, like, when I had braces on my teeth I immediately noticed the straightness, whiteness, etc. of someone's teeth. Now I don't really care.

Except about mine, which, after 3 years of smoking, are starting to look dingy.

First dental visit since summer '93 is pencilled in for May 1st. Contrary to what it says on the NHS website, my local dentist doesn't take non-fee-exempt NHS patients so I'll be paying full-whack, however much more that is. Wish me luck.

I enjoy going to the dentist. My dentist is next door to hstencil's office. Last time I went, "Who Sucked Out the Feeling" by Superdrag kicked in on my minidisc player right as the dentist was giving me my novacaine shot. I thought that was special.

eep

1. Propensity for dental caries (plaque etc.) is not equivalent across the board. There is evidence that some people are genetically predisposed to have more trouble with it than others. It also gets worse as you age.

2. Most people don't know how to properly brush their teeth in the first place because they have bad habits from childhood that nobody bothered to correct. My buddy with the drills told me that a soft brush is best because you're not scraping the glass clean, you're wiping it down, and the softer the brush, the easier it is on you to get a good swabbing around the gumline.

3. Of the over 500 diff. types of microorganisms dwelling in your mouth and feeding off the plaque, at least a few have been linked to heart disease and other more serious illnesses. Once your gums become inflamed, the blood barrier is weakened (hence the bleeding when you floss sometimes) and you become susceptible to infection from the things that live in your mouth. It's vaguely frightening. Also, viruses take up residence in your toothbrush - if you continue to use the same toothbrush after getting over a viral infection, it can become a vector and you can get sick all over again.

There's the full extent of the hex he put on me. I hope you enjoyed it.

Woah

the technician showed me the on-screen 3d rendering of my tooth & it was O_O

they have all kinds of amazing tech gadgets there, its p cool

.

Update: I have an April 23 appointment for wisdom tooth removal. Must cope with tooth pain until then, but at least I have a day to anticipate. Already laying in chicken soup in anticipation of the recovery period.

good luck <3 sending good thoughts for a relatively painfree recovery, or a comfortable one at least

Thanks. Friday morning means I can hibernate Saturday and Sunday. I may even take narcotics, if the dentist will give me any.

honestly coming off the whatever the fuck they pump into your arm was the worst part of it for me. was prescribed Vicodin but never needed it for the pain. I took some anyway and it was not really all that fun. ate Spaghetti-Os for 10 days straight. sucked but whatever, I didn't dry socket myself and that's half the battle now isn't it

the worst two-word combo in English language

dry

socket

Hello from my preop bed, where I just talked with the anesthesiologist and told him I have zero concerns about pain post knee surgery after my dry socket experience earlier in the year.

Having three impacted wisdom teeth out turned out to be nbd; hope ot is similarly smooth sailing for you jlu!

Update: Teeth removed earlier today, feeling surprisingly little pain! I didn't even have to ask for a limited prescription of narcotics to get em through the weekend.

When I got my wisdoms removed years ago, I was prescribed percocet: take one every four hours. But I took four every one hour and don't remember anything at all

O_O

are you even here now

Gah, apparently I need a root canal. Scheduled for next Tuesday (wish it was sooner because I'm in pretty persistent pain atm). Anyone with root canal stories to share? I hear and would like to believe that modern anesthetics have made it a less grueling experience than it used to be. tbh I'm totally over this stupid tooth, which has been a periodic problem for about 8 years, so the idea of drilling the shit out of it is actually pretty appealing.

my mouth is fine, it’s my youth that’s the problem

Will there be a crown as well? Root canals suck, but so does going to the dentist. I have a fatalistic attitude, and something like dental masochism: I know it's the right thing to do, so bring it on, pain & all.

You might try taking a couple tylenol (not ibuprofen) before you go in, to bolster whatever they inject you with

i’ve had a couple. you have to keep your mouth open for an annoyingly long time but otherwise they were fine. i got a crown each time. i think each one took three visits all told.

I didn't feel any pain during or after my root canal/crown but I guess it's common enough he gave me a prescription for 30 vicodin that I never filled.

Was still smoking at the time so the most annoying thing was my lips feeling too weird to smoke for several hours.

yeah i think the hardest part is the amount of time w mouth open in the chair, especially if it’s a big molar

but it’s worth it, given the pain beforehand yknow?

my dentist does same-day crowns bc thrh have a 3d printer thingy which makes it longer still but: having not to come back or deal w temporary crown is cool as hell

I've had more than my share of both root canals and crowns and have never been given narcotics. Waiting for the numbing stuff to wear off is the worst part of it. Also, if there's any cement left over from the crown, that can be irritating but will crumble away in a few days.

VG, I went in for a crown about a month ago and my dentist had just gotten the scanner/3D printer thingy, but when they tried to use it on me, it wasn't working correctly. They called tech support with me just reclined in the chair with my mouth propped open the entire time. Eventually, a decision was made just to do it the traditional way.

booo

:(

Thx for the reports! Yes, there will be a crown at the end of it but I have to go back to my regular dentist for that. So they'll put some kind of temporary thing in there and then I'll go back to him to finish it off. (Hopefully very quickly, because I gather there's a risk of cracking til you get it properly sealed.)

I had a crown done recently, and the biggest PIA was having to go back multiple times to get it fitted/tested!

The worse one for me was root planing. Ugh. Never again. It made every tooth in my mouth so sensitive I could hardly eat for weeks. And my stupid country wont give out strong painkillers for nothing, which blows.

My gums are all swollen around the infected tooth, giving me for the first time in my life that classic cartoony puffy toothache face. Because it’s just on the left side of my face, my wife says I look like “a grizzled dock worker chipmunk, sitting at the bar.”

Pro tip: don’t let your regular dentist do a root canal. Insist on a referral to an endodontist!

Yep, that’s what I’m doing. My dentist, to his credit, said “in my younger days I would’ve just done this myself, because I thought I could do everything. But I have learned that it is better to let specialists do some things.”

I had two root canals, one of which was on a badly infected root. It was an extremely unpleasant experience in my case. A lot of nervy pain, because for some reason the anaesthetic wouldn't properly penetrate the nerve, so, well, anyway, it wasn't great. But the important thing is that I would do it all again, because the pain I was experiencing in the run up to the first root canal was horrendous. I was taking four max-strength ibuprofen tablets just to try to get a couple of hours' sleep at night. I could only eat soft foods and drink tepid drinks on one side of my mouth. So, yes, the two hours in the chair were bad, but they were worth it.

Second root canal was preventative, and it was an absolute breeze in comparison.

thinking about life before modern dentistry is 😬

I got a root canal in Peru in the early 90s. When I came back to the States, the guy who had to extract the tooth asked if he could share my x-rays with his students, to show them what not to do.

yeah i had a root canal done in my hometown in australia when i was a teenager & my dentist in the US said it definitely did the job but the work was more like “field dentistry in a battlefield” than modern dentistry standards lol

Haha, the guy said he'd seen worse, but only from Russia.

thinking about life before modern dentistry is 😬

Had this exact thought the other day when the pain got bad. I guess in the old days they just woulda got some pliers and yanked that sucker out and splashed some whiskey on it or something.

yeah there was a Dollop podcast episode about George Washington’s teeth & it sounded like absolute hell on earth, truly nightmarish - dude had to have been in excruciating pain 24/7

Update: So yeah, the root canal was really not bad. Uncomfortable, obviously, but only a couple of twinges of actual pain during it. And there's been no real pain or soreness from it since. Heading to get the crown today, so that should seal the deal.

In every sense! wtg tipsy

Fair play, well done on getting through it.

The tooth my crown's on, I was told may need root canal eventually if the root dies under the crown. Honestly, cant I just get the tooth extracted instead its just a back tooth, I'm already missing a few thanks to orthodontic work so IDC

I broke one of my heavily filled back teeth two days after Christmas 2023. Finally got the sucker crowned today. What a palaver.

I recently came across a, I think, Tiktok video by someone who went to Mexico for a root canal and crown, and explained the price differences & the experience. Someone else in the comments said that their implants were priced at $30,000 in the US or like $6k in Mexico, which is the procedure I've needed for many years and what's holding me back. Hadn't considered that before but...maybe?

I had an excellent experience with dentistry in Mexico!

did you get any gold fillings quincie?

I now have a 100% overbite and something like 11 undamaged teeth. I will never be able to get them taken care of in my lifetime.

one tooth at a time

After many years of negligence, I've really started staying on it.. bought a Phillips Sonicare electric toothbrush on eBay, and floss once if not twice a day... I have some monster fillings from the 80s and my dentist thinks I should start planning out some crowns over time, but I'm gonna let it ride for now

My Mexican dentistry experience included two root canals (quick, painless), filling repairs, and perfect crowns on my two front teeth. I don’t recall what everything cost, but it was maybe a quarter of what it would have cost in the US. Oh and they offered me valium before the root canals!

brb googling flights to mexico

I don't even have a dentist any more. Although one positive thing about not having a dentist is that I don't fuck about + brush thoroughly two or three times a day, and am doing it like I've just had a lecture from a dental hygienist.

One tooth at a time is still hundreds of dollars at a time, and free clinics don't do the kind of surgery that I'd need.