Today on This Old Mouth

This liquid diet thing is not too bad, but trying to eat solid food is kind of a drag. It is a weird act to work the food into my mouth, past the enormous upper lip, and into the back of my mouth for the molars to take care of business. I finally got to eat some solid food last night. I made ground turkey Shepherd's Pie and I was gonna eat some of it come hell or high water.

Yesterday, my mission was to try to get in to see the oral surgeon, Dr. Stigall, to see about getting an implant inserted in the socket of my missing tooth before it collapsed. A few phone calls involving the obtaining of an appointment in Boone at 1:30, arrangement with my Dad to skip one of his community college classes to drive me up to Boone and back (thanks Dad!) and then a phone call telling me how much I was expected to pay (up front) in order to have the procedure done IF they decided to do it today.

I got to the office on time, waited a not unreasonable time period, got a panoramic x-ray ("bite-right-here-with-your-front teeth-oooooohhhhh-as-best-you-can) and then sat in a chair and waited. Dr. Stigall came in, took a giant needle and began injecting my gums and the roof of my mouth with anesthetic. I've had about 20 injections of anesthesia in my gums and roof of my mouth in the last two days and I think 7 or 8 of those was yesterday's visit.

After waiting a bit for my mouth to get numb, giving me a couple of more injections for good measure, Dr. Stigall came in and got to drilling. He drilled a hole about 2 inches to 2 feet deep into the tooth socket and up into my jaw. He then took what looked like the cotter pin of an old style ashtabula crankset and inserted it into the hole. Apparently, this little piece functions like the expander wedge you put in a carbon steerer tube as he turned something on it and it began to expand and wedge into the hole he had drilled. He then took some little thing and screwed it into the wedge. I assume this is where the new tooth will eventually go.

I'm wondering if they can make me a variety of teeth that I can take off and put on as the mood strikes me, or if I should just go gold tooth and be done with it...