Tooth tales

Who forgets that they're having wisdom teeth pulled until they're sitting in the dentist's chair ready to go? Scroll down to the post below, rest your eyes on the chick with the nerdy glasses -- you're lookin' at her.

To my credit, my dentist is so great about calling and reminding me of appointments a few days in advance that I don't even bother to write them down. I did think it was a little soon when I got a phone call on Friday to notify me of Monday's "appointment" (note to dentist: PLEASE CLARIFY TYPE OF "APPOINTMENT" OR I WILL AUTOMATICALLY ASSUME IT'S A CLEANING) and when I looked back at my work calendar, I saw that my last appointment was in February. I wasn't sure why I'd made a dentist appointment four months out instead of six, but I was sure there was some kind of wacky Alison-type reason at the time.

Back in 2007, I had my wisdom teeth pulled by my dentist -- all but one (get this...I got my wisdom teeth pulled the same day I found out I was losing my job. The good news was that once I found out about the job, I completely forgot about the massive jaw pain I was experiencing). But that pesky last one was impacted and would need to be removed by an oral surgeon. The whole concept freaked me out so much that I put it off and put it off, even though the pain sometimes kept me awake at night. Well, I waited so long that the tooth basically righted itself and reared its head enough that it was only slightly impacted. At my last appointment, my dentist told me that he'd be able to take the tooth out in the office. Apparently, I wholeheartedly agreed, and scheduled this extraction for June 16. NOW I remember that I did this.

I sat down in the chair, prepared for the metal scraper and the gritty toothpaste, and suddenly the hygienist handed me a consent form. Wait a second...now I have to sign my life away for fluoride treatments? I gave her a puzzled look.

"You do know you're getting a tooth pulled today, right?" she said.

OH. CRAP.

I was so not mentally prepared to get my tooth pulled. I told her about my mix-up and she said they could reschedule, but I would have felt awful about wasting a 90-minute slot on my busy dentist's schedule because of my lack of ability to write things down. The only reason I was really worried was because Brad and I had to move all the furniture out of our bedroom to prepare for our floor installation Wednesday, and I think "no heavy lifting" is right below "no going to hot sauce tastings" on the list of things not to do after getting a tooth pulled.

But anyway, I did it, and Brad moved most of the furniture himself while I pulled up more carpet staples. Honestly, the surprise was to my ultimate benefit, because I didn't have time to get nervous. The extraction went very well, and now I'm proud to say I am wisdom-tooth free. I'm actually in a fair amount of pain this morning, but the bleeding is over with and life doesn't stop for a little bit of pain, so I'm going to work today armed with a lot of Advil.