Wisdom teeth extraction comes with painful price

My easiest trip to the dentist office occurred two weeks ago when I had my wisdom teeth removed; the pain didn’t come until the following day.
Some history: Like Jerry Seinfeld, I’m a bit of an anti-dentite. I have painful memories as a youngster of getting a silver cap placed on a molar. Too much sugar, I guess.
Growing up less fortunate in that my parents didn’t have health insurance or much money, trips to the dentist were few and far between. I didn’t mind, but when I did go, it often involved drilling and pain, which could have been avoided if I had gone more often.
I paid a heavy price in adulthood for not seeing a dentist for regular cleanings in my youth. Excruciating tooth aches eventually led to root canals for many of my molars, including my wisdom teeth.
Root canals sound as painful as they feel. Although advances in dental technology and procedures have eased the pain, sitting on a dentist chair for two hours and holding your mouth open the entire time while the dentist and his assistant probe into the deepest parts of your tooth is not a pleasant experience. Doing it for three appointments triples anti-dentite feelings.
The root canals didn’t work as well as hoped, as another dentist told me I should just have my wisdom teeth removed.
The thought of having someone remove some of my teeth brought forth visions of the scene in the film “Castaway” when Tom Hanks’ character yanked out his own ailing tooth and then passed out. I can watch any horror film and not be bothered by gruesome murders or buckets of blood, but watching him do that nearly caused me to pass out.
Others, including my wife, assured me that wisdom teeth removal is painless, so I agreed to go forward with the procedure, much to my reluctance.
I had hoped it could be postponed, though. Several days before having it done, I developed a minor cold, and not wanting to get the dentist sick I called and asked if it should be delayed. No such luck, as I was told the dentist could still do it.
The night before the procedure, several co-workers told me horror stories involving their own extractions. One told me she woke up in the middle of it, and another said she remembers looking at herself in the mirror on the ride home and seeing blood drooling out of her mouth.
By the time I sat in the dentist chair, constant worrying about it had already numbed me enough that I didn’t feel the dentist slip an IV in my hand that soon put me to sleep. It would have been a great sleep if I didn’t wake up in the middle of it, just like one of my co-workers had.
I remember the dentist doing something inside my mouth, but thankfully that’s all, as they must have upped the IV medication to put me back to sleep. I was still half asleep when it was over and when I left the dentist’s office because I don’t remember them taking me to my wife’s vehicle in a wheelchair, or her leaving me in the car while she filled a pain pill prescription at the pharmacy.
That night went quickly. I watched the season premiere of “The Office,” but when I watched it again a couple of days later I discovered I missed most of the episode the first-time around. I went to bed earlier than normal that night, thinking the experience was the easiest one I’ve ever had at a dentist’s office.
It wasn’t until the next day that the pain finally came. It wasn’t a horrible pain, but it was annoying enough that I actually had to take the pain pills and I continued to do so for a week. As a firm believer in avoiding any medication whenever possible, I was happy to go against my principles to be a little more comfortable.
Two weeks later, the pain is gone, but I still haven’t gotten used to the feeling of having just gum where I once had teeth.
In talking about the experience with my mother, I asked her about the time I had a silver cap placed on a tooth. She claims this never took place, that I’m having memories about an event that never occurred. We could have never afforded it, she said.
I remember it, though, and also recall when this baby tooth fell out as I got older. I thought I could get rich selling the silver from the cap.
Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe my anti-dentite feelings have been brewing for so long they’re creating false memories. Besides, I would have been able to afford more dental visits if I really did possess the silver from a capped tooth. And then I wouldn’t have had to have my wisdom teeth out.