That's what she said

Internets, guess where I went today?

Yep. You guessed it. I went to go visit the official dentist of the local NFL team. Apparently I had a few cavities that needed some filling and "doctor" thought she could do three of them in one sitting, only she forgot who she was dealing with.

A lot of people dread the dentist and they all have their reasons. I don't dread the dentist for the routine cleanings and whatnot, but I do dread special procedures. Especially procedures that cause me to have to open wide for long periods of time. Here's the deal. I cannot open my mouth very wide. It's adequate, but barely so. I always wonder what kind of notes dentists write in my file about my little issue, and then even more what they think when they look at their schedule and see that they get to have me, Little Ms. Micromouth, in their chair that day.

When doctor thought she could fill three cavities in one appointment I had mixed feelings. On the one hand I'd only have to go through the agony once, but on the other hand the thought of keeping my jaw open for 90 minutes was exhausting. It's the one physical feat I cannot do--okay, that and touching my toes. When she boldly stated that she thought she could do all three fillings at one time, I should have spoken up.

Note to self: you cannot handle three cavities being filled at once.

Ever ambitious, doctor thought she could handle it all, she has a bag of tricks, but they are no match for my mouth. She tried propping it open with a little bite blocker, but sadly, I can't even open my mouth wide enough for it. So she just had to take it slow, take frequent breaks, and maneuver the drill at funky angles to avoid it getting jammed stuck. Every so often she'd ask me if I could open a little wider, and I'd try with all my might: eyes clenched shut, neck muscles shaking, jaw unhinging a little. And by the little chuckle she'd make I would realize two things, 1) I was making a ridiculously strained face of pain and 2) the effort it took to make that face only yielded me a couple of millimeters of additional space.

Needless to say, we had to call it quits after two fillings. Man was my jaw tired. And was my face numb. As I left the office, they told me not to eat anything until the numbness wore off so I didn't inadvertently bite my tongue or cheek. Of course as soon as they said that, I was hungry. When I got home, I snuck a handful of peanuts--that I chewed very lightly on the non-numbed side of my face. I felt like I had just gotten away with breaking some very important dental laws. But I didn't bite my tongue or my cheek, so neener neener.

After about an hour, I started to regain feeling and the feeling I was gaining was something caught between my gum and cheek. Uh oh. Peanuts. I very carefully reached into my mouth to try and get the lodged particle out, but it wasn't a peanut. Actually, I didn't know what it was. I mean it kind of looked like a little piece of wood, and it kind of felt like one, too. It actually looked like a shim. But why would I have a shim in my mouth? It certainly wasn't to prop it open, or if it was, it didn't really work. Seriously, what the what?


And to prove to the Internets that I'm not a liar, I took a picture of the shim. Look, ma! It's longer than half an inch (you might notice that it's broken. I did that. I had to to see if it was wood or not. It kind of looked like a julienned carrot. And then I was horrified that it was a julienned carrot, only I didn't have a julienned carrot today, so where did that julienned carrot come from? Thankfully, it is wood--because that makes a lot more sense than a julienned carrot).

I'm not going to lie, one of my first thoughts was to go grab some Krazy glue to put it back where I found it.