Only had it once, for my wisdom teeth removal. They had me count down from 100, and I made it into the 70s, which was long enough to know they put those sticker monitors on me, which they said I wouldn’t know. But I could have sworn the put on 4.
I woke up immediately after that, and stood up, feeling no pain in my mouth from bleeding. They laughed at me, so I must’ve looked really drunk. After my mouth filled up with blood, I figured out why they had me biting on something, and bit on it. Then I slept on the ride home, and remained tired for a few days, but I don’t know if that was the pain medicine.
(I had expected that I’d be really wired for sleeping so long, but not so.)
Oh, I did have local a few other times. Never worked properly in dentistry (save for the surgery). Did work fine on a boil they had to remove, until it started wearing off.
Wisdom teeth out as a youth, I was told “count back from 10” I got to 9 and when I said 8 I realized I was in the recovery room.
Had some surgery on my foot in the army. The woke me up part way through (i guess they do this to make sure the brain is still good) I distinctly remember that, it was disconcerting. Then I was talking to the recovery nurse about repairing the vitals monitor screen.
I had some light form of anesthesia for a colonoscopy and apparently cried and occasionally screamed throughout. They made a note in my file to fully sedate me next time around.
I go for my second root canal (same tooth) tomorrow. Not entirely sure what they’ll use since novocaine wasn’t effective.
I had it for an colonoscopy. I remembered a cool sensation in my arm as the anesthetic was introduced. The next thing I was in the recovery room and it was all over.
For my first ESWL surgery (kidney stone) they gave me Versed in the prep area, wheeled me into the room where the tub was and had me slide over onto that table which had a hoist. Once my hands were strapped in position and my legs were strapped they told me they were stating the meds. All of a sudden I had the nastiest taste in my mouth but I could barely say “That tastes terrible” before I was out. Next thing I knew I was in the recovery room and I was not wanting to wake up all the way. For the first time in years I was waking up not in pain (later that day, OTOH).
In my adult life I’ve have 4 surgeries that required general anesthetic - hip, knee, shoulder and elbow. In each case I went under easily, remember nothing and woke up quickly, fully and hyper. In fact, the first thing I remember hearing after my shoulder surgery was the recovery room nurse saying “Whoa there, Bud, you’re not supposed to be awake yet!”
As for Novocain and the like, I have had more than my share - some good, some bad. i always hate the “pins and needles” feeling when it wears off, though, so always request the minimum amount to do the job. I’d rather feel a little pain during the procedure than prolonged pins and needles after.
This was my experience as well, the only time I’ve been put under. And I have got to say, for someone like me, that never gets a good nights sleep, I can almost understand how something can become addicting. Best sleep I’ve had in years!!!
I’ve had general twice - once for a tonsillectomy in the 70s, and once for a tubal ligation in the 2010s.
For the first I was supposed to be kept overnight but ended up staying in the hospital for 3 days because I couldn’t stop vomiting.
I mentioned that to the surgeon for the second surgery but she assured me that they use different drugs now that aren’t as hard on you, so she was sure I’d be fine.
I almost vomited in recovery, but I don’t know if it was from the pain or the anaesthesia. After they gave me a shot of dilaudid I was fine. Really fine. Like, really really really fine.
ETA: my dentist is a magician with novocaine. Or I’m easy to numb up. Or a combo of the two. It only takes one shot for me, and about half my head goes numb. Previous dentists were not as successful, but I’ve never had much trouble with not going numb.
When I had my gall bladder out, they didn’t tell me ahead of time that they’d be putting in a catheter for the surgery. So, my memory of anesthetic is counting down from 100, getting about five numbers in, and suddenly I’m in a different room and my dick hurt.
I’ve had three knee surgeries and my wisdom teeth removed. The three knee surgeries were general anesthetic, and the teeth were just nitrous oxide and injected local anesthetic.
The three generals were pretty similar with one exception; on one they gave me Versed(midozalam) which is a sedative which causes amnesia. The ones without it were pretty “standard”, in that I remember them strapping me down, and then the anesthesiologist and I were talking, and he was telling me what he was putting in- the muscle relaxer was memorable because it relaxed my eyes and my vision went blurry. Some sort of sedative or something was given to me, and I recall losing consciousness. Then waking up wrapped up like a burrito in blankets after the surgery with no recollection of the interim.
The one surgery where I got the Versed was a LOT weirder, in that I was sitting upright, talking to a nurse, and she said she was giving me the Versed, I told her I knew what it did, and then WHAM, I was wrapped up like a burrito and laying on my back with my eyes closed. Disorienting to say the least. I’ve since heard from a good friend who had an upper GI endoscopy and got Versed beforehand that his experience was similar. Which was really interesting, because I was in grad school at the time, and had time to pick him up after his procedure, eat lunch with him, and drop him at his house before going back to school. From his perspective, he went to the doctor’s office, got the shot, and woke up several hours later in his bed at home, with a full stomach.
The nitrous oxide was more like getting REALLY drunk- I didn’t feel any pain, and wasn’t unconscious, but I felt like I was upside down and floating around. The cool part was that it wore off, and I was good as new- no hangover or anything like that.
I’m one of those people they write articles in dental journals about: hard to numb -> pain -> terror -> harder to numb…
About 10 years back, I switched to a different dentist after avoiding going in for 18 months due to fear of dealing with a painful tooth. She was the first one who EVER suggested anything more than novocaine. Her recipe is: Halcion (a benzo) + nitrous oxide. I’d never had either before - well, aside from whatever they gave me to tilt the room for my nose surgery in 1989, and I think I had one dose of Xanax, once… but never nitrous.
Nitrous doesn’t make me floaty per se, but does let me relax - to the point where I don’t care, lalalalalalala… Add that to a stiff dose of Halcion, and I was in that chair for 5 hours and that was cool. She said I wouldn’t even be aware of time passing; well, I pretty well was, but I just didn’t care!
On a more recent occasion, with just nitrous, I really, really felt like I couldn’t get enough oxygen while they had me hooked up before starting (they do it for a few minutes beforehand, to let it take effect). And I kept thinking I needed to move the mask off my nose… but couldn’t find the initiative to actually do so. I did manage to make myself take every other breath through my mouth, so I got enough oxygen then. I need to talk with them about that before the next time. It’s actually a titch frightening to think that I could be so relaxed that I couldn’t do anything about slow suffocation.
In any case, I don’t know if the nitrous itself offered much in the way of analgesia, but the extreme relaxation let the injected stuff work better, and made it easier for them to do the injections.
I’ve only been under anesthetic once in my adult life, a few years ago when I had a colonoscopy. It was very disorienting to wake up in a different room, seemingly just after closing my eyes for a moment, and be told the procedure was completed. Wait - what?!?
There wasn’t someone monitoring your blood oxygen levels? They can do that with a clip on your thumb. (At least, I think that’s what that is for.) That’s super scary.
General has always knocked me out instantly, with no ill effects, and no passage of time. If there is no afterlife, that’s what I imagine death to be like, not too shabby.
Amnesiacs also work well, and I hear I’ve always been a good patient. I find that method fascinating.
Local is hit or miss. I’ve had experience where it did it’s job just fine, felt nothing, and a couple instances where it felt like they were shooting me up with water and the pain was excruciating.
Nitrous gave me fairly unpleasant dreams. I still remember having a dream about a giant mosquito and an alien from getting oral surgery when I was in elementary school (nearly 50 years ago!) (The worst part about nitrous for me though, is it stays in my system and gives me dizzy spells for months after having it.)
When I had my wisdom teeth out, I was given a pill to block pain, and a pill to put me out. The pill to knock me out didn’t start working until after I had gotten back home. (Fortunately, the pill to block pain worked perfectly). I still remember starting to see double while watching TV, and “Chitty Chitty Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Bang Bang” came on. And you know just how significant things seem when you’re on drugs? Ian Fleming (of James Bond fame) wrote that story.
I’ve had full anesthesia several times. I’ve had a couple times where I went through an “on drugs” period before conking out, but most of the time I’ve gone from “Here’s the drugs to knock you out” to “We’re all done now” with no awareness of anything in between.
I’ve also had twilight anesthesia once, and hopefully never again. Not that I minded being awake for the procedure, but my stomach doesn’t handle well being awake and not fed at the best of times. Throw nasty drugs on top of that and I couldn’t take a sip of water without throwing up.
I’m wondering about the amnestics, and what happens if you do experience something significantly painful during that part. Presumably you’re capable of reacting to the pain - do they then dose you with more to knock you further out? What if what they’re doing is painful enough to cause an instinctive reaction of, say, slugging someone?
I assume I’ve never committed violence… I had no unexplained bruises after my wrist surgery, for example.
A friend was undergoing some procedure or other, and her husband was still with her when they gave her the sleepy stuff. She has no memory of this, but evidently someone said “say goodbye to your husband” and she did… VERY passionately (I didn’t get any details beyond that). He tells the tale with great relish.
Well, I’ve “gone under” with amnesiacs several times. Never for anything that would cause extreme pain, like cutting, just uncomfortable stuff they need your cooperation on. The times I’ve done it were for dislodging food caught in my throat (this happened a couple times), and colonoscopies. One time my doctor was openly hostile to me, asking me if I was gonna pay him in not a nice way (I was uninsured at the time), and I “woke up” to one of the monitors ripped off leaving a painful red mark. I do think I was abused somewhat, just a bad feeling. It’s kind of scary what they can do, but I honestly have zero actual memory.