Pulling Teeth

This past Wednesday I had two teeth extracted at Dr. Reinish's office. He's a dental surgeon located at Eglinton and Warden. I was referred to him through my dentist, Dr. Lily Lo.

I got there pretty early and sat in the waiting room. After some time I was taken to another room where they were going to take two of my teeth out. They were the bottom ones at the back on the left side (number 36 and 37). I had root canals done on them in the past. But, over the years the jaw bone on that side had a series of infections. So they thought it best to extract them and put in implants.

Dr. Reinish gave me a needle to numb the area shortly after I went in the room. Before he left he said he'd come back in 10 minutes to check if it was numb enough to do the extractions.

A little while later he came back and asked me if my bottom lip felt like I had 'a fat lip'. I told him it felt a little funny, but not exactly like that yet. So he gave me another injection and said he'd come back in another 10 minutes or so.

He was gone for a long, long time. Probably more than half an hour. I guess he had someone else to operate on. I took a nap. Luckily I wasn't in a hurry to go anywhere.

When Dr. Reinish finally returned he started the extraction. Of course my lower jaw was completely numb by then. He was very good at explaining what he was doing. He mentioned I would feel tugging and pulling and would hear cracking noises (which I did) and not to be alarmed (which I wasn't). Every now and then he would enquire if I was feeling any pain or not (which I didn't).

The first tooth (#36) came out relatively easily. The second (#37) was more trouble. He had to yank pretty hard at it. I think it broke into smaller pieces. He had to get his drill out and drill it a few times too.

After he removed both teeth he cleaned the area where the infection was and sutured the opening.

I received some notes on follow up care, some gauze to stem the bleeding and a prescription for pain killers if I needed them.

Afterwards I stopped by my parents' place to pick up some supplies then went home to rest.

Surprisingly I didn't feel any pain. It's strange, but I'm not complaining. I think it was the same for me when I had my four wisdom teeth removed over 25 years ago. I don't believe I felt much pain after that either (if my memory serves me correctly).

There's still a bit of bleeding now. Hopefully it won't last too long. Blood and saliva don't taste good at all. Since I'm not supposed to disturb the area of the extractions, I'm not supposed to spit it out. But I do sometimes. Swallowing it is just nasty.

In three months I'm supposed to go back for a follow up appointment. At that point they'll assess the situation and see when they can book me to receive the implants and I'll fork over a few thousand dollars for their trouble.

Three months with a huge hole in my mouth. Ugh! Too long.