Excuse me while I act like a big whiny baby, but my tooth hurts…waaaah!
Okay, more specifically, my gums hurt. One of my wisdom teeth decided to rear its ugly head and split my gums open. It really hurts. I’ve been taking asprin for it and that’s been helping. I just scheduled an appointment with an oral surgeon for the 27th. I don’t want to wait that long to see someone about it. I tried to stress that it really hurts and I am obviously a special case who needs to be seen sooner than the 27th, but the receptionist didn’t seem to see it that way. She did suggest that I take some ibprofen for it, so I guess I’ll switch to that. I feel a little better about taking ibprofen regularly than I do about taking asprin regularly.
When I was cutting my wisdom teeth I found that chewing a clean, hot as I could stand it wet wash rag helped some. I don’t remember what else I found to chew on. Probably my dentist wouldn’t have liked it much. I am thinking it was the end of a new (cheap) toothbrush that I got back in there and clamped down on to help the tooth break through faster. They say dill pickle juice can help ease a teething baby because of the vinegar in it. The vinegar helps shrink the gums away from the tooth, to ease the tooth’s passage. Good luck. Go easy on the ibuprofin, you can damage your kidneys taking too much of it. (I mean don’t consume it as if it were candy.) Same with tylenol.
Yeah, thinking back it was a smooth handled new tooth brush. I’d clamp down on it, then let up every so often, basically giving in to my urge to bite/chew. I’d wash it and put it in a toothbrush case when I was done with it.
ditto on the ibuprofin. a former SO trashed his (in this case) liver while attending boot camp for police officers. he’s injured a knee and only got through the required - and rigorous - physical training by overdosing on ibuprofin. bad idea. to this day he has to watch his intake of painkillers of any kind because of impaired liver function.
as far as the gums go, find some anbesol which is usually used on teething babies.
if all else fails, got whiskey? drink a little, rub a little on the gum. you’ll feel better - or not care that the gum hurts in the first place.
I had a real toothache last week - *wake me up in the middle of the night * agony in my jaw. I started on co-codamol (paracetemol/codine) alternating with ibuprofen. I got an emergency appt to see the dentist on Monday - he ran an xray and said “abcess. I can pull it or I can root it - either way way you need antibiotics first”. I was in so much discomfort I said I would have it pulled - then reconsidered and decided that I could afford 2 visits to have it rooted (I work on a daily rate 3 hours from my dentist - a visit to the dentist means a days pay if I can’t make it up). All this is on the NHS, so it won’t cost too much, but they would not give me a bridge if the tooth gets pulled.
So I am 4 days into the antibiotics - the pain is less and I am no longer continually on painkillers, but my first appointment is the 28th - 2 weeks for the abcess to flare up again and delay the treatment.
I believe you. I remember back when I had the same problem. I was working at McDonalds, and of course I had no money and no insurance. I had gone to work, and as usual half the crew didn’t show up and we were getting slammed. The pain was getting to the point where I could barely function, so I begged for a bathroom break. When I (finally) got it, I took the razor from out of the boxcutter, sterilized it with a cigarette lighter, and slashed open my poor swollen gums. Ah, sweet relief! If the razor hurt at all, it was so much less than the tooth pain I never knew it. I felt so much better and I’ve never had any trouble with it from that day to this.