Wisdom Teeth

April 2nd held a lot of firsts for me: my first surgery, my first IV...my first time taking heavy duty pain killers... All because I got my wisdom teeth out (which was also a first, of course ;) ).

The appointment began with a consultation. Dr. Park examined my X-rays and told me a little bit of what to expect. I had all four wisdom teeth and I had room to keep the upper ones but not the bottom ones. Of course, the upper ones would have nothing to bite on so all four had to go. The top teeth seemed to be the easier ones; they were both facing the right way, although still under the gum. The bottom wisdom teeth had grown some root so the chance of paresthesia was about 5-10% for one side and about 20% on the other side. Both bottom teeth were sideways and would require stitches. The doctor also predicted that some of the bone would have to be taken on the left side. (That kind of freaked me out. Well, I guess the whole extraction freaked me out so nothing new.)

After the consultation, I was taken back to one of the ORs and everything went very quickly from there. I was given some pills (ibuprofen and something for nausea) and hooked up to monitors (an EKG,  a pulse oximeter, and a blood pressure machine) and was put on oxygen. Dr. Park then came in and placed my IV. I wasn't too nervous for this part and I was right to not worry about it. I didn't feel anything at all because they used some kind of spray that turns cold on the arm. The doctor then asked me how I was feeling. I responded "Alright" and then, after a couple of seconds, "Actually I do feel a little weird". And that's the last thing I remember. I don't remember feeling tired or anything, I just went unconscious in a single instant. It's the weirdest/coolest feeling to think back on.

The next thing I know, I'm sitting in a wheelchair in a hallway and the assistant who helped with my surgery and my mom are there. I was involuntarily shaking all over. Through the grog, I heard the assistant tell my mom that the shaking can sometimes happen as a side effect of the anesthesia. I also remember the assistant asking me how I was doing. I told her that I was thirsty so she brought a can of apple juice and gave me some in a little syringe. This was way too much for my confused brain to comprehend so I grabbed the whole can and tried to drink. I didn't realize or understand that my mouth was full of gauze; everything was numb for Pete's sake! So I basically just succeeded in soaking my gauze in apple juice, dribbling it on myself, and creating the opportunity for the assistant to have to change my gauze. It was funny because I didn't link these events in a logical way at the time. In fact, it was a few days later that I actually pieced together what happened. I just figured that I needed fresh gauze anyway and I had no clue as to why I couldn't properly get the apple juice down. My mom tells me that at this time the assistant also relayed all of the post-op instructions to her (but I don't remember any of this).

On the way home, we stopped at Smith's so my mom could fill my prescriptions. The drive was all a blur; I don't remember much of it. I just waited in the car while she ran in. I alternated between dozing off and writing in my journal (I wanted to write the experience while I was still a bit loopy to see if I'd write anything funny).

By the time I got home, I was pretty alert. Time seemed to pass in weird ways for the rest of the day though. I had to keep the gauze in to stop the bleeding for quite awhile and it was the most annoying thing ever. It was uncomfortable and anything I said was very mumbled and difficult to understand.

Recovery hasn't been too bad. I'd say the worst part was the Lortab. It made me feel sort of light-headed, the kind of light-headed experienced when you've been awake all night and you're so tired your head swims. It (or something) only made me nauseous enough to throw up once which was probably due to the fact that I didn't eat very much with it that time.