Ok so this will include details that some people may find gross, and you will probably end up knowing way more about my teeth than you ever wanted to.
I'm writing this here just to have it all in one place and also to be a cautionary tale about tooth care. Also please no "expert" advice I am already consulting those with medical degrees and dealing with this.
So I never took very good care of my teeth, I don't know why I just didn't. A couple of years ago I go to the dentist after putting it off for a while for a regular checkup. Now around this time I was really busy and stressed out with stuff. the gums directly behind my two front teeth and one other tooth began to get inflamed, then receed and break down and get a spongy feel to them and actually start to come off. They were sore and would bleed A LOT, on a hair trigger too. so when I go into the dentist I point this out to them. The dentist takes a look and thinks it may be something called ANUG, that stands for Acute Necrotizing Ulcerative Gingivitis. Google it if you want but it's nasty. Now if I did have it (and we're still not entirely sure if that was it) it would have only been a very small and mild case compared to what I saw online. So the did a couple different things, first to be honest this scared the shit out of me so I started taking better care of my teeth and my dentist admits that I do take better care them, a lot better. They gave me medicated mouthwash and had me take vitamins and when I was in for a filling the gave me a scaling while I was already frozen. after the scaling and a little recovery time I got my gum pockets measured and to be honest I didn't do to badly almost all 2s and 3s with one 4 all things considered that's not too bad.
The breakdown of my gums stopped and then reversed and they healed back to where they were and we went on with my life. Then it happened again, I got checked out again and saw a periodontist who at the time said it looked like I had burned my gums or scratched them with something. Basically it started to heal on it's own, helped by the fact that I scrubbed and bled it thoroughly. I've since learned that basically when I get a great deal of stress and/or low sleep it will come back. Usually shows up every 3-4 months for a few days to a week or so and then goes away pretty quickly. It's just something that happens when my immune system gets week and never gets very severe, never as bad as the first time and only behind my front two teeth.
It sucks but I live with it and just take better care of my teeth and honestly it's not too bad, and I can tell when it's starting and help it go away faster.
Then last august I decided to go to a con, it was a lot of fun and I want to go again this year. However a few days before going I took a bite of something that jabbed behind my front tooth a little, and this hurt, A LOT. the pain went away pretty quickly and I just figured my gums were flaring up again as they get sore when they do. Boy was I wrong...
During my vacation I began to get toothaches, really powerful sharp toothaches that would come and go. The pain would shoot around a few different teeth in the top, middle right of my teeth. I couldn't really do much about it at the time and seemed like it was fading away anyways so I left it until I got home. well when I got home I still had the tooth aches but they were lessening. I saw the dentist about a week after I got home. However before that my gums swelled up a lot, and my gums even split a little behind one tooth, (front right tooth) and when i finally got to the dentist my cheek had swelled up a bit and was rather sore. My tooth also developed a weird pressure sensitivity, basically if it was touched in one spot I'd feel it in the whole tooth.
The dentist took a look and prescribed some antibiotics. I went on got the drugs and got to spend the next few days begin absolutely exhausted to the point of not even being able to sit up for more than and hour or two, fortunately due to timing I only missed one day of work. The drugs cleared up all of the symptoms but a new one appeared. A lump on my gums that will swell up and leak puss. yeah I know gross, I think it's an abcess. While I didn't have the tooth ache as much I did feel a pressure one my front tooth and when I open my mouth I feel a tugging on it as well. The dentist inspects it and takes some xrays and determine that it is directly connected to one specific tooth, one of my canines, right next to my front tooth.
So I got to have a root canal, oh yay, do the happy root canal dance. oh joy the freezing came out halfway through So after that lovely experience (getting used to a new shape for my tooth was weird) I was given a another prescription of antibiotics at some point as well don't exactly remember at what point that was. about three weeks later I call the dentist again asking when the lump is actually supposed to disappear...
Well that means another trip to the dentist. They decide to send me to a specialist, I go to see an orthodontist. The orthodontist does an inspection and measures my gum pockets around my front tooth and make a discovery. my front tooth has ridges on the back of, the dentist had noticed this and taken xrays to make sure it hadn't been cracked, which it hadn't. well it seems these ridges make a groove that continues down past my gums, if you've ever had you gum pockets measured you know it's not pleasant when its a 2 or a 3. This was an eight, and he measured it. twice. I think that was quite frankly the most painful experience in my life. He determines that basically they need to reshape the tooth as it is basically an open hole in my gums and it may be connected to the abcess.
So this is late october by the way, we schedule the surgery for Jan 25th after all is said and done. While I wait I discover that breathing in cold air can make my tooth hurt sometimes, welcome to fucking Canada. I still feel the tugging and pressure sometimes. So we finally reach the surgery day, after booking off work and arrangements at school that is. So I go in, they freeze me, cut open my gums discover it's not related to the abcess, grind my tooth down, put in bone mineral to regrow the bone a little (it's cow marrow based I'm a minotaur now.) and then sew me back up. I spend the next couple days recovering, bleeding, oozing that sort of stuff with medicated mouthwash and more antibiotics, the gums have healed back together now but my stitches are still in I'm getting them taken out tomorrow. I have noticed the feeling of pressure is gone and the pain from the cold air is gone too at least. I'm curious to see if this will help prevent the gum condition mentioned about a few hundred words ago. So the theory right now about the abcess is the next tooth over is infected or the root canal was ineffective.
So tomorrow stitches out, general check up on the 14th and then another followup on the 22nd.
My sister when I was telling her part of this had an irresistible urge to floss, to which I say good. The moral, take care of your teeth.
I'm writing this here just to have it all in one place and also to be a cautionary tale about tooth care. Also please no "expert" advice I am already consulting those with medical degrees and dealing with this.
So I never took very good care of my teeth, I don't know why I just didn't. A couple of years ago I go to the dentist after putting it off for a while for a regular checkup. Now around this time I was really busy and stressed out with stuff. the gums directly behind my two front teeth and one other tooth began to get inflamed, then receed and break down and get a spongy feel to them and actually start to come off. They were sore and would bleed A LOT, on a hair trigger too. so when I go into the dentist I point this out to them. The dentist takes a look and thinks it may be something called ANUG, that stands for Acute Necrotizing Ulcerative Gingivitis. Google it if you want but it's nasty. Now if I did have it (and we're still not entirely sure if that was it) it would have only been a very small and mild case compared to what I saw online. So the did a couple different things, first to be honest this scared the shit out of me so I started taking better care of my teeth and my dentist admits that I do take better care them, a lot better. They gave me medicated mouthwash and had me take vitamins and when I was in for a filling the gave me a scaling while I was already frozen. after the scaling and a little recovery time I got my gum pockets measured and to be honest I didn't do to badly almost all 2s and 3s with one 4 all things considered that's not too bad.
The breakdown of my gums stopped and then reversed and they healed back to where they were and we went on with my life. Then it happened again, I got checked out again and saw a periodontist who at the time said it looked like I had burned my gums or scratched them with something. Basically it started to heal on it's own, helped by the fact that I scrubbed and bled it thoroughly. I've since learned that basically when I get a great deal of stress and/or low sleep it will come back. Usually shows up every 3-4 months for a few days to a week or so and then goes away pretty quickly. It's just something that happens when my immune system gets week and never gets very severe, never as bad as the first time and only behind my front two teeth.
It sucks but I live with it and just take better care of my teeth and honestly it's not too bad, and I can tell when it's starting and help it go away faster.
Then last august I decided to go to a con, it was a lot of fun and I want to go again this year. However a few days before going I took a bite of something that jabbed behind my front tooth a little, and this hurt, A LOT. the pain went away pretty quickly and I just figured my gums were flaring up again as they get sore when they do. Boy was I wrong...
During my vacation I began to get toothaches, really powerful sharp toothaches that would come and go. The pain would shoot around a few different teeth in the top, middle right of my teeth. I couldn't really do much about it at the time and seemed like it was fading away anyways so I left it until I got home. well when I got home I still had the tooth aches but they were lessening. I saw the dentist about a week after I got home. However before that my gums swelled up a lot, and my gums even split a little behind one tooth, (front right tooth) and when i finally got to the dentist my cheek had swelled up a bit and was rather sore. My tooth also developed a weird pressure sensitivity, basically if it was touched in one spot I'd feel it in the whole tooth.
The dentist took a look and prescribed some antibiotics. I went on got the drugs and got to spend the next few days begin absolutely exhausted to the point of not even being able to sit up for more than and hour or two, fortunately due to timing I only missed one day of work. The drugs cleared up all of the symptoms but a new one appeared. A lump on my gums that will swell up and leak puss. yeah I know gross, I think it's an abcess. While I didn't have the tooth ache as much I did feel a pressure one my front tooth and when I open my mouth I feel a tugging on it as well. The dentist inspects it and takes some xrays and determine that it is directly connected to one specific tooth, one of my canines, right next to my front tooth.
So I got to have a root canal, oh yay, do the happy root canal dance. oh joy the freezing came out halfway through So after that lovely experience (getting used to a new shape for my tooth was weird) I was given a another prescription of antibiotics at some point as well don't exactly remember at what point that was. about three weeks later I call the dentist again asking when the lump is actually supposed to disappear...
Well that means another trip to the dentist. They decide to send me to a specialist, I go to see an orthodontist. The orthodontist does an inspection and measures my gum pockets around my front tooth and make a discovery. my front tooth has ridges on the back of, the dentist had noticed this and taken xrays to make sure it hadn't been cracked, which it hadn't. well it seems these ridges make a groove that continues down past my gums, if you've ever had you gum pockets measured you know it's not pleasant when its a 2 or a 3. This was an eight, and he measured it. twice. I think that was quite frankly the most painful experience in my life. He determines that basically they need to reshape the tooth as it is basically an open hole in my gums and it may be connected to the abcess.
So this is late october by the way, we schedule the surgery for Jan 25th after all is said and done. While I wait I discover that breathing in cold air can make my tooth hurt sometimes, welcome to fucking Canada. I still feel the tugging and pressure sometimes. So we finally reach the surgery day, after booking off work and arrangements at school that is. So I go in, they freeze me, cut open my gums discover it's not related to the abcess, grind my tooth down, put in bone mineral to regrow the bone a little (it's cow marrow based I'm a minotaur now.) and then sew me back up. I spend the next couple days recovering, bleeding, oozing that sort of stuff with medicated mouthwash and more antibiotics, the gums have healed back together now but my stitches are still in I'm getting them taken out tomorrow. I have noticed the feeling of pressure is gone and the pain from the cold air is gone too at least. I'm curious to see if this will help prevent the gum condition mentioned about a few hundred words ago. So the theory right now about the abcess is the next tooth over is infected or the root canal was ineffective.
So tomorrow stitches out, general check up on the 14th and then another followup on the 22nd.
My sister when I was telling her part of this had an irresistible urge to floss, to which I say good. The moral, take care of your teeth.
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