Laid Low By Teeth

One of my jokes is "do you know when the typical man will go to the doctor?"  The answer is that the typical man will go to the doctor when he can't get the bleeding stopped himself.

I'm not big on going to doctors, don't ask me why.  Probably it's at least partially a scarcity mentality; I begrudge the time and money it's going to cost.  There's probably also some stubbornness and pride in there, too.

Add to that a freaky pain threshold.  There's some evidence that things that are supposed to hurt don't bother me as much as they should--I'm not one of those poor souls who don't feel pain at all, but I've had the occasional doctor (and dentist) quizzically inquire "and you're saying that doesn't hurt?"

(By the way, "pain threshold" is often confused with "pain tolerance."  The latter is how much pain you can stand, the former is how much you actually feel.  I'm as big a wimp about pain as anybody; I just don't experience as much of it as most people.)  But pain is the body's warning sign that something needs attention; I've had to have one tooth pulled because the cavity never gave me more than mild discomfort (and I ignored that) and by the time it WAS troubling me it was too late to save the tooth.

So right now I'm dealing with an impacted wisdom tooth and with a mild tooth abscess in the molar next to it.  It really doesn't hurt much--a slight ache and discomfort when I bite on that side of the mouth is about all it amounts to--some evidence suggests that in most people it would be hurting a LOT.  But I've been running a low grade fever for a couple of weeks now, and that's getting old; I've just generally been unwell and dragging and fatigued.

So, oral surgery coming up, whee.  I finally broke down and went to the doctor, although I should have gone months ago when I first noticed some trouble with the tooth.  Currently I'm on antibiotics, which will hopefully take care of the fever.  Preferably soon, I've been feeling pretty crummy.

And I probably won't learn anything from this lesson about going to doctors either.

Hope all's well out there, friends, and God bless.