I’ve had this done once before. It wasn’t fun then and it still isn’t fun now.
On Friday April 20th I went to a periodontist to have a gum grafting procedure done. They take tissue from the roof of your mouth and stitch it to the area that you have receding gums. I had the procedure done back in 2006, only they didn’t use my own tissue. At that time, they used a substitute, and it didn’t work to help my gums not recede. Since then the two center bottom teeth in my mouth have receded severely and I have started to have bone loss in the teeth because of this. So back in for procedure #2, only this time it was necessary to use my own tissue.
Overall, the procedure itself was not horrible. I wasn’t knocked out, much to peoples surprise. I was just severely dosed up on Novocaine. I even drove myself home after the surgery was done! Talk about a trooper huh? The worse part of my time at the periodontist was listening to the soft rock on the radio. I knew I should have brought my iPod!! (Consider that a little bit of advice to any of you that are going to have this done.)
It has been 10 days now since the surgery and I am FINALLY not in that much pain. On the one week anniversary date, I was starting to get really nervous because I was still in an incredible amount of pain. Not where they grafted the tissue to my gums, but where they took the tissue from the roof. They put packing on that area but the first night it fell off while I was sleeping. Thankfully, I didn’t choke on it (I can hear the news anchors now – girl chokes on packing from gum surgery, details at 11). Since then it has been…lets call it a challenge to eat and not have my tongue hit that overly sensitive area. It has been so bad that the pain has actually spread to my teeth, making it feel much more like a toothache than anything else. Eating was the most unenjoyable event for me, and in case you couldn’t tell from previous posts, I love eating! Work was torture because I had to talk and by days end my mouth was throbbing. All I looked forward to was getting out of work, doing my school work, and by 8 taking my codeine and going to bed. I felt like a pill addict.
So here we are. Sunday. Day 10. How do I feel? SO much better than I have felt since the night before I had all of this done. This is the first day I haven’t taken any pain medication. Last night was the first time I had any alcohol since the procedure. Did the red wine cure my pain? I can’t say, but you do the math!
I’m still eating carefully because although the tissue has started to heal on the roof of my mouth, it still isn’t great. All I’m craving is a taco…and I don’t care what happens I’m eating one on Cinco de Mayo come hell or high water. My follow up appointment is this coming Friday so I’ll try to update you all with details on how it has all went. I have packing on the gum line and can’t see what it looks like. I feel like the people that get revealed after having plastic surgery on those reality shows. Let’s hope the audience doesn’t gasp when they see me!
End rant.