If you're like me and don't floss your teeth like ever (until I turned over a new leaf last year), you might have a disease that you might not even know you have, Periodontitis. I mentioned in my previous post that my gum disease required super hard-core cleaning (i.e. pulling back your gums and digging the dirt out!) and thankfully under local anaesthesia (which totally explains the above warning).
I was late for my appointment because apparently my baby decided today would be a good day to wake mummy up at 5.30am for her feeds and then mummy couldn't go back to sleep till an hour later and ended up oversleeping (-_-"). Dr Alex (my dentist) wasn't too pleased of course, but he still decided to start the treatment even though I was a face of crankiness and only replied in grunts and nods (I'm really not a morning person).
Before starting treatment, Dr Alex injected anaesthesia directly into my gums.
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| Credits: sciencephoto.com |
Once he is sure I'm suitably anaesthetized, he proceeded on to stripping my gums back and then scrapping and scaling the teeth that is hidden under my gums. Although I didn't feel any pain during the procedure, I did feel a lot of prodding and scrapping. I thought I was going to faint, what with the light shining into my eyes and water/blood accumulating in my mouth.
Dr Alex: Open your mouth... how are you doing?
Me: Ugh.
Dr Alex: I don't understand, does that mean you're ok?
Me (slight nod): Ess ('yes')
Seriously, how does he expect me to respond when half my mouth is numb, I've got tubes in my mouth and I have to open my mouth wide?!
(Sorry, Dr Alex. I don't think you're reading this but in case you happened to stumble upon this, I'm still feeling pain in my gums so forgive me..)
The whole thing took only 30 minutes but it felt like 30 hours to me! I thought it would never end! So after the final procedure of polishing of teeth, when he said the magic words, "ok we're done!", I was so relieved that it was finally over (yes, I totally forgot I have to suffer with the pain once the anaesthesia wears off).
Except that it wasn't over. I still have to come back one more time to clean the other side and remove my wisdom teeth. Sigh..
The thing is, if I don't get it treated, I'll really lose my teeth one by one. No teeth or treat gums? I really don't have a choice here.
If you thought this was really horrifying and never want to go through the same experience, well I have good news for you: you don't have to.
All you have to do is follow three simple steps:
(1) Brush before you sleep
(2) Floss your teeth (the more your gums bleed, the deeper you need to floss)
(3) Visit your dentist every 6 months
Do the same for your kids. Or they'll end up like me. Suffering.. (Owww..)
Schedule a dentist appointment for you and your child. Go do it. Now!
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