<h/t to Questionable Content (and Faye) for the title idea. Seriously, if you aren’t reading that amazing webcomic I don’t know what is wrong with you. I really don’t.>

Sorry to have been briefly in absentia, again. This has been a somewhat crappy week month or so.
Let me ‘splain.

No, no. There is too much.
Let me sum up.

Buttercup I have had ongoing dental issues for years. In part, this is because I have an absolute terror of dental folk. It’s <mostly> not their fault, but that doesn’t change the fact that most dentists give me a case of the shrieking heebie-jeebies.

So, I avoided them like the proverbial plague for many years. On top of that, I spent a few years being somewhat lacking with my at-home dental care¹. Which means I am now playing catch-up with the dental stuff.
Joy.
Trumpets.

About five years or so ago, I had a root canal on one of my lower molars. During the procedure, it was discovered that the roots of my teeth do not run straight, like most folks.

Even my teeth are bent, people.

When they went in to do the procedure, not only could they not get all the yucky material out of the root, but a piece of the tool snapped off and was left in my tooth.
Apparently this is quite common.

Fast forward to last month.

My face/jaw blew up.
Well, not literally.
OK, kind of literally.

I was running a fever, had excruciating pain, and felt pretty well awful.
I went to the dentist and they put me on antibiotics and pain meds because facial infections are bad, mmkay?

I wound up missing a few days of work because of all this.

I guess I should take this opportunity to point out that I work for a contracting company in a call center. Do you guys know how much sick time I get?

Fortunately, my company is actually a pretty decent one. I had to sign a piece of paper stating that I would not miss any more work/be late for sixty days. But I got to keep my job!

Fast forward exactly two weeks after I finished the antibiotics course.

Yeah. It re-infected.
This time the dentist referred me out to an endodontist. Essentially endodontists are root canal specialists.
Or, you know, torture masters. I’m not exactly sure which title they prefer, honestly.

At any rate, he wanted to do something called an ‘apical root canal’² because torture master he deemed it to be the best course to get the situation permanently taken care of.

Now, I warned said Endo-guy that no, really…scared of dentists. He said “No probs! We will totally make sure you are completely unaware/do not remember anything! Trust me!”

They gave me medication, which I took according to directions. Apparently, it either was not a high enough dosage or it was a bad lot. Because shit went awry, folks.

I was awake and aware the whole time.
I wasn’t in pain, precisely. Well, except for the Novacain shots. Those hurt like a mad bastard. But, yeah. I totally was present for the entire thing.
Of course, poor endo-doc was pretty well locked into having to complete the procedure. What else could he do?
But, I am equally sure that having a terrified woman who couldn’t move except to sob while he worked was probably not one of his happiest moments.

I gotta say, it wasn’t one of mine either.
But I did it.

And I am not blaming (torture master comments aside) the endo-doc for the medication fuckup. He had started the process – quitting and rescheduling made no sense.

I get that.

But, I still feel like I should get a goddamn gold star for adulting that day. Because I was the adultiest adult who ever adulted last Friday.

ANYWHO.

When I got back to work, of course, there was some hemming and hawing and WTF happened and why were you out? sorts of noises.

Again, my contracting company is top notch, and everything got sorted. Still have a day job (yay!). But, I did have to bring a note from the doctor.
Which, yeah documentation, I get you.
But honestly? It kind of made me feel like a kid being called into the principal’s office for suspected truancy.

Which just feels like utter and complete BS at my age.
————–
¹– This is because when you are living in the back of a cab-over-camper, and doing subsistence work to make ends meet, keeping up with the flossing is not really high on your To-Do List. It should be. But, it wasn’t.

²– Google ‘apical root canal’ at your own risk. I will warn you that some of the pictures/descriptions of the procedure are pretty gruesome.