Snow Sucks

I know, that’s not an actual song title...yet. It will be when I’m done writing it. I don’t quite have the tune down pat yet, but the lyrics....oh, the lyrics!....I’m using my favorite suffix...

-uck.

-Uck allows for several prefix choices and it clearly gets the point across. At times, words are meant to express, not impress.

My mom calls this “swearapy”. She swears by it. Me? I’m still a little torn.

The pros: it’s cheaper and works much faster than traditional talk therapy and/or medication.
The cons: You can’t do it at the dentist’s office because your mouth is busy and it’s just not all that attractive anywhere else. I have an image to maintain.

See here on Hysteria Lane, not only have I been voted as having the “Best Pedicures On The Block” because I like rhinestone designs on my toes, I have also been voted “Most Laidback Wife/Mom”, too. I think if the neighbors caught me screaming vulgarities in my driveway, I might just lose that title.

Anyway, It snowed again here in Chicago. Under normal circumstances, I’d only find this a mild nuisance, but there is something wrong with my jaw and teeth again and the cold air makes me yelp a little bit. A lot.

It -ucking hurts!

I also have an extremely high pain tolerance, so I know if something hurts me this bad, it would send the vast majority of people running to the emergency room for narcotics.

Since I was contemplating whether or not jamming a fork through my face might help with the pain, I decided it was time to visit my dentist.

I am a tooth clencher and there was a crack in a molar that already had been cracked, filled, cracked again and filled again to pretty much it’s capacity, I guess.

He would try to repair the filling, but he really thought I was probably going to need a root canal based on the pain sensations I was describing. He was, of course, correct. The filling didn’t work, so I subjected myself to a root canal treatment. It wasn’t painful, but everything about the dentist sets off my panic alarms.

I know he thinks I’m a little crazy and it bothers me tremendously that the impression he has of me is some woman who freaks out, like I do there.

That’s only a small part of my personality. I tried to explain it to him.

To me, everything about the dentist is a trigger. I take tranquilizers before I go there and I’ve even tried the gas, which is supposed to calm you down and make dental work tolerable for us panicky people.
Only, I can’t stand the dissociative feeling the gas produces and I panic. No sedation for me.

I have a personal space barrier, as does everyone. When I’m laying back in that chair and have a masked man hovering in my personal space, it makes me anxious. I can’t help it. I like my dentist. It’s not him. He’s a great guy. It’s the dentist stuff.

The worst thing to do when one is unnecessarily anxious is to just sit there. You need to change your mind’s focus...get distracted...walk it off....do something.

Except you can’t do that at the dentist because you’re stuck there, staring at the ceiling trying to avoid eye contact with the masked man which leaves your mind free to run with all kinds of thoughts that don’t involve warm, happy beaches and gardens of flowers.

And... I can’t even tell him I’m going to freak out because my mouth is full of sharp instruments and Lord only knows what else, leaving me screaming on the inside, as my friend so aptly described it yesterday.

Screaming on the inside leads to panic attacks, which is, of course, what happened.

Very ugly long story short, I somehow managed to finish the root canal, but even Xanax couldn’t calm me down for the rest of the day.

To make matters worse....after all that, it still hurts like -uck. Especially when exposed to cold air. The breeze combined with cold is excruciating and having to stand outside cleaning sleet, slush and snow off my car (hello! it’s spring!) is, well, torturous.

This shouldn’t be happening and it’s leading the dentist to believe that I’m having some sort of atypical facial nerve pain issue.

Whatever this is, it has me -ucking screaming, inside and out.