So I had the wisdom teeth yanked yesterday...

Tis called the "high before the O.D." Careful! There's a reason doses are put out.

Old wives tale - dab whisky on the sore bits. This helps.

I just stuck my tongue in one of the holes (on the tops) and it feels like there's something spikey up there. Is it a nerve or something? It almost feels like a piece of tooth!

With hindsight, I would recommend going under. Though the whole procedure (all four teeth) lasted less than an hour, it was pretty traumatic! My heart was racing.. and I'm usually a tough guy about that kind of stuff (dental and otherwise.).

The spiky bits will be splinters, the last of mine came out last weekend and it was very odd, in my mouth they felt huge, but sitting there in my hand they were tiny.

All right, I'll watch for the splinter. Is it big enough to make a voodoo necklace? They whisked my teeth away before I was able to ask for them back.

I saw my tooth sitting in two pieces on the table, covered in blood, and came very very close to fainting

In my memory I spent half my childhood bleeding from the mouth or with broken limbs. Collarbone then my arm 3 times in 4 years (scary gen. anaesthetic each time) - social services thought my parents were abusing me :(

Oh, and I had five wisdom teeth (the dentist said that was the first time he'd seen that).

I was told (afterwards thankfully) that they have to 'dislocate' your jaw to get at them in those cases.

This anecdote makes my mom sound stranger than she is.

As far as pain relief went, I just had paracetamol because I am ROCK HARD. I can still feel lumps at the back of my mouth. The gums have grown over, like moss grows over tree stumps.

Thanks for the chefs anecdote. Will think of that before I go under. And the other guy's mother sounds pretty normal to me.

The procedure itself wasn't too bad. Injecting needles (8 times!) into my gums wasn't as scary as I thought, though the hacking & drilling for three of them wasn't fun when you see (your) blood splatter everywhere.

general
anesthesia

I realize some people are more at risk to adverse reactions to the anesthetic than others, and of course, going under is more expensive (I think).. but assuming you're not, and/or you can afford general anesthesia... please go that route...

never in my life have I been so scared of going under before the experience, and then coming out of it going.. "holy shit... that's it... :) i just go home now and just spit into a cup a lot, and watch dvds, and put frozen edamame on my cheek for a while.. and not have to go to work.. awesome!"

also, the surgeon told me to open my eyes while he was doing performing the extraction.

That's nuts! I would have ignored him.

I had seven shots, but only had two teeth removed -- you beat me on total shots, but my shots/teeth ratio is higher. And seeing the teeth come out was kinda cool.

Donut, I had cysts taken off my neck twice under local. The first
time was during the '94 Winter Olympics and I remember the surgeon was babbling about Kristi Yamaguchi while he was cutting the cyst out. I wish he'd paid more attention to what he was doing because he apparently didn't get all of it -- it got infected and I had to go back and have it done again (different surgeon) the next year, again under local.

There might be a chance I have to take it to an oral surgeon, though, if they can't get it out.

Depends. If they can just be pulled out like ordinary teeth, dentist. If the roots have grown sideways (wisdom teeth usually do), oral surgeon. (because of the possible incision that has to be made to get them out)

That's how it is in Belgium. YMMV, obv.

General anaesthesia is the way to go - although I didn't get a choice myself.

Any post-removal infection stories?

Anyway. Yes, take the pills.

ditto. it wasn't as bad as i thought it was gonna be fortunately. expensive though.

what is NOT ok is the excruciating pain which i'm sure isn't coming from the socket - i think it's my tongue, right at the back next to the socket. if i keep my mouth closed and still it's uncomfortable but i can ignore it - eating, smiling, laughing and TALKING are agonising though. no painkiller i've tried so far helps. (apart from the scary strong ones my friend had when she had her ankle tendons operated on - she's recovered and had spares, but there are only two left and i'm saving them for after my second wisdom tooth extraction.) whisky helped for about five minutes.

the weird thing is, this tongue pain only started four days after the operation.

i am going round looking at solid food like a kid in a sweetshop.

Question for those of you who had your wisdom teeth yanked: how long did you have to take off from work?

But it depends on person to person... some people just need two days, others need five. I advice making the appointment Thursday, and sacrificing a weekend, if work is an issue.

Also, I can stress this enough, but can understand given how scary general anesthesia is for people who never went under before.. but it really really helps in the overall experience, and removing memories of it. The chances of you getting killed in a transit accident on the way to the doctor's office that morning are greater than you dying from a freak allergic reaction to the general anesthetic.. decent doctors will test and make sure that the anesthetic will not harm you.

There are always horror stories, but these are so far and few in between. Far more frequent medical horror stories are never told, because the stigma involved with those experiences just don't connect as fearfully as OMG HFS WISDOM TEETH REMOVAL OMG HANG ME!!!!1

I was only 16, and it was summer vacation, so I didn't miss any time from work, but I was out of commission for a good 3-4 days after getting all of mine taken out at once. I barely remember the first 48 hours following. My operation was pretty full on. Because I was so young, the teeth were still pretty deep, and I actually got a general anaesthetic. The doctor asked me to count backwards from 10, and I can remember saying "9".

Afterwards, there was a fair bit of tenderness, which was to be expected, and a lot of bloody gauze, but Tylenol 3 managed to keep me pretty comfortable.

Looking back at it almost a decade-and-a-half later, it's not something that I would want to go through again, but it's certainly not the end of the world.

I still have my teeth in an envelope somewhere at my mother's house as well.

A tooth that is, not a baby. That would have made the papers.

-- Nathalie (stevi...), October 2nd, 2006 10:10 AM. (stevie nixed) (link)

... this means your wrist must have been at least shattered into 5,000 pieces before you decided to go to the doctor:

http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/3834/foto23xm6.jpg

in 8 hours slkjdflksjflsd

will be liveblogging

Just had mine out 6 hours ago. Weird experience - the doctor said I needed to be put out completely, but the laughing gas/whatever was in the IV didn't work hard enough, and I was awake for the whole thing. In fact he specifically said I wouldn't remember anything but I remember it all. Not that it was bad - they call it laughing gas for a reason. I actually thought the surgery was kind of fun. As I'm sure has been mentioned, even if you're awake for it, you don't really care what they're doing to you. Now it's pretty sore, I have gauze in and out of my mouth, not really swollen (yet?)

Does anyone have some advice for what do to afterwards? It said I'm not supposed to do the "salt water rinse" until tomorrow but I'm not sure why. Also I don't really want to eat or drink w/ gauze in my mouth but if I remove it I kinda bleed a lot so I'm not a fan of that either.

You'll probs bleed all night, keep the gauze in. hold off on the salt rinse thing, you need a clot to form over the wound and if you rinse too hard or early you can knock it out and get dreaded 'dry socket' (had this a few weeks ago) which is proper painful. Think you can get this from sucking on cigs/milkshakes too.

avoid sucking on anything for a while

oh yeah "NO STRAWS!!!!' is it just on one side of your mouth?

also, you can cut the gauze down into a smaller piece, so that it isn't as annoying. It's worse when it's dry imo.

aren't you only supposed to keep the gauze in for like twenty minutes tops? it needs to clot naturally at some point

you're supposed to change the gauze every hour or so for the first day or until it stops bleeding.

I actually thought the surgery was kind of fun.

yeah, when i got the gas i was all "fuck it, you can take all my teeth! :DDDDD". A+ would get gassed again.

So glad mine were taken out under general anaesthetic.

Hated it. No gas. Felt violated.

You'll probs bleed all night, keep the gauze in. hold off on the salt rinse thing, you need a clot to form over the wound and if you rinse too hard or early you can knock it out and get dreaded 'dry socket' (had this a few weeks ago) which is proper painful. Think you can get this from sucking on cigs/milkshakes too.

Oh yeah, I know about this. not sure if I should start the salt rinse now, it seems okay, but I am actually kind of terrified about getting dry socketed, especially on a weekend.

I was supposed to be on GA but I guess I'm an ox. Thinking back to it - I vaguely remember the noises, remember trying to small talk a lot and being told to shut up, remember how many people were in the room and what they looked like, but the more I think about it the more I realize I must have "missed" some time since it seemed like it only good 5 or 10 minutes.

yikes, had to take off work today - I keep waking up with the taste of blood and it's really obnoxious, and I've been lightheaded for the last few days - how long is this recovery going to take???

I'm supposed to have a tooth pulled this week. They usually use some IV sedative, which is supposed to pretty much knock you out. Kind of nervous about it, but I'm also not super-excited about the thought of being awake - so I'll probably go with the sedative.

I was signed off for a fortnight after mine all came out, and I needed that long!

I think the stitches are gone now, but I'm not really sure. My gums are still messed up. Really not sure what to eat but I'm really craving a hamburger. I mean, I like chicken soup, pancakes, and Chef Boyardee Beef Ravioli but I really, really want something solid.

http://hollywoodhatesme.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/flies.jpg

How awful should I let wisdom tooth misery get before calling a dentist? Bottom right one has been bothering me for a week--I've been able to treat it with scotch and Mexican vicodin but I'm running low on pills. Tooth itself is poking out a little but there's still a fuckload of gum around it. Am I just, like, teething?
― adam (adam), Friday, February 17, 2006 8:41 PM (10 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

in a really weird coincidence i just had the two left wisdom teeth removed on 2/17/16, ten years to the day after i made this post. nauseated off the painkillers but otherwise not bad.

Huh, I forgot that a past dentist told me that my wisdom teeth were in fact impacted. (They grew in about halfway and stopped, and normally don't bother me.) My current dentist wants me to have them removed; she gave me the names of a couple of local oral surgeons. I need to start doing my due diligence. I hope they're far enough out that the surgery will be minimal....

Ooof

Agh impacted wisdom teeth. Good luck finding a surgeon. One of my wisdom teeth is impacted and I no longer have dental insurance - I could have dealt with it cheaply years ago,silly me. Although I actually saw a surgeon and then didnt pull the trigger because I didnt like him and when I googled him he had had a sexual harassment claim from an employee (which made me feel vindicated lol).I'm 36 and this specific one only emerged through gum in the last couple years,the remaining three all came in straight but I had one removed because it didnt fully emerge and left a flap that was troublesome for cleaning and led to gum issues.