PAIN IS A PAIN

ENDODONICS

Pain is a feeling triggered in the nervous system. Pain may be sharp or dull, be sporadic or constant. Pain can be helpful in diagnosing a problem. On Friday I began to feel pain from a tooth on the right side of my lower jaw. On Monday I failed to identify for my dentist from which of two teeth the pain was being generated. Remember that point. The following day, Tuesday, after an agonizing night, I felt I could identify the problem tooth. It was infected and it received a root canal procedure. During the night I continued to experience acute pain and on Wednesday I was in the dentist’s chair again at 8 AM to have another root canal on the tooth beside it. Rare, but it happened, two teeth experiencing a Phoenix abscess at the same time. This is one of the severest pains.

However, yes, however, near the end of the procedure, my experience with pain took a turn yesterday. I customarily handle pain as well as anyone, having had a life time history of cluster migraines until I was about 60 years of age, and having sat enough times in a dentist’s chair, this time, after several days of various degrees of pain, I had developed such a level of anxiety during the procedure, that my body suddenly felt cold and I began to shake involuntarily, breath rapidly and I became incoherent and disoriented. That was alarming enough for the dentist to call 911, so paramedics with a fire truck and ambulance were dispatched. By the time they arrived I was recovering. Christine, returning from the beach, passed the clinic and saw the emergency response vehicles, as well as my parked car but decided not to pop in because there might be a lot of commotion due to some incident inside, and she continued home. There she was greeted by a voice message telling her, not to be alarmed and that I was OK but on my way to Hospital for tests. She could pick up my car at the clinic. The voice message was mine. En route to hospital, a paramedic gave me his phone to call home.

I am hypoglycemic and my blood sugar was low, and together with that, my pain and fear of more pain triggered the Vagal nerve to respond by shutting down a few connections. So after another 5.5 hours in the Emergency ward I came home at 7:30 PM. And here I am the day after, still on post operative meds and happy to be relatively pain free.