Okay, not quite $1,000,000, but so far we are up to $31,000.
Holy crab cakes. Thank you prednisone and methotrexate!
*insert eyeroll here*
After almost an entire year of budgeting, saving, stressing, selling our souls, children, kidneys and fearing – we had enough to get my teeth dealt with.
August 26, 2015 (the day after my wedding anniversary) I spent 6.5 hours in surgery having all my teeth removed, my entire jaw filled with bone grafts, gums with skin grafts, and 4 titanium implants placed in my lower jaw. After which I am now the not-so-proud new owner of $4,000 dentures.
I am 30 and have dentures.
That sentence will never feel natural.
It probably sounds strange, but it’s a very emotional ordeal…After the surgery I literally looked like Richard Nixon- if Richard Nixon got into a bar fight and was covered in bruises with 2 black eyes.
I developed a close relationship with my denturist – yes, I have a denturist… and I’m 30. I saw my denturist every business day after my surgery for 2 weeks, then every 2 days, and so on and so forth, until present when I see him every 3 weeks.
Thankfully Zed really likes my denturist, and they get on like bandits. Whenever we go in and he is with me, they spend half the time gabbing and chatting like school boys – it’s kind of adorable.
The ride home……
Oh, the ride home. I debated sharing this part of the 5th ring of hell experience…. They drugged me up fairly well, even to the point my throat was froze, which meant I could not swallow anything. Unfortunately there was a misunderstanding between the nurses and Zed, and Zed thought I was to have no pain medication until we got home after the 2.5 hour drive…. in actuality, because I could not swallow they gave me pain medication to take ON the way home to keep the pain under control. Zed refused to give it to me, under the impression that I was not to have it because I already had pain relief. Sigh.
I am going to try to paint a horrifying picture for you…
A small, normally unassuming, 30 year old girl.. swollen so bad I am almost unrecognizable with my entire face and throat froze, bleeding profusely from my mouth with no means of controlling it, and without the ability to talk in any comprehensible manner. If you picture something akin to a victim in a Saw movie – it was very much like that. I was still groggy from the anesthetic so not only could I not be understood, I did not have the mental capacity to know that I couldn’t be understood. I’m not sure why, but I don’t come out of anesthetic well… Did I mention that I get hulk-sized, irrationally furious each time I wake up from being put out? And there is absolutely no consoling me until the anesthetic works it’s way out of my system. Poor Zed…. I can only hope and pray that image of me is not burned into his memory. The first, last, and only time I have ever told my husband that I hated him, was during that ride. It was the only words that were actually understandable from my frenzied shrieking.
What this all translated into was a horrific and terrifying scene…. me lividly screeching gibberish- causing blood to spray all over myself and the vehicle, all the while drooling my face off, decrepitly attempting to drink apple juice which just dribbled feebly out of my mouth and onto my chest and lap.
Not my best moment…… Not my proudest moment…
So that was my surgery experience with my teeth. It still makes my heart hurt to think about it, and I can honestly say I have never been so ashamed… God knows why, but Zed still loves me. Hopefully we will never have to go through that again.
Emmbeezee 