Face Transplant or Root Canal -- You Be The Judge

That babe in France ain't got nothing on me. She had her face ripped off by her dog when she overdosed on drugs and fell asleep. I feel like I had my face ripped off by a school of piranhas at the endodontist. And I was wide awake.

Endodontist is another word for a dentist who says this is going to hurt you more than it hurts me. He was very soothing in his toothside manner, describing every gory root canal step along the way. In fact, he was so thorough I could probably perform the next one myself. May there never be a next one.

But first, the doc numbed me with enough heavy duty Marcaine to immobolize a large horse. I had warned them in advance, don't skimp on the drugs, please. Kind of like an alcoholic who can slam down a case of beer and not show any signs of losing consciousness.

So much local anesthesia isn't necessary for most people but my body soaks up the regular stuff like a sponge. This not only meant that the endodontist had to give me the extra strong stuff, he had to stop three times to give me even MORE. Because I could still FEEL what he was doing.

The root canal procedure took less time to get in there and take care of business than cleaning my teeth. Faster than you can say my face looked like I had had a stroke, especially when I tried to smile, he was into that aching back tooth of mine, reaming out the three nerve roots, filling them up with something like Play Doh, and pronouncing me ready to go home and take the rest of the day off.

All things considered, it was painless, well except for the painful part, a couple of times during the drilling, when I was absorbing Marcaine faster than he could pump it into me.

This was my first root canal. Before he started the doc said he thought I was about as relaxed as a person who is in an endodontist's chair getting ready to have a root canal can be. I thought so too. I often fall asleep during teeth cleaning, so why not a root canal?  Haaaaaaa.

I was still relaxed even after reading the long list of things that can go wrong during a root canal, which I was required to sign. My favorite was the one that said the instruments can break off and may be left in there.  EWWW.

In their favor, the dentists who do these things have created a whole new set of advanced procedures, a bunch of fancy new drills and other tools, all designed to get things done quickly. Since that's all these guys do all day, the process is rather streamlined. I wish I had a picture of all the stuff that was in my mouth. Retractors, suction, strange things I can't describe.

I was breathing through my mouth, then my nose, then my mouth, with a plastic surgical protective cover that obscured most of my face. I was also given a set of dark glasses so I looked cool from the eyes up.

Now that I'm home and the anesthetic is wearing off, I'm waiting for a pulsing ache to take its place. But, so far, nothing, not even where the needle stuck me at least a dozen or so times. I was in a lot of pain before the procedure. Throbbing from my left ear to my lower right jaw. All my teeth ached until the pain got bad enough to wake me up in the middle of the night when everything localized in that back tooth. 

Anybody got a hernia operation to share?