A week ago I went to bed happy as a clam, perfectly healthy and woke in the middle of the night, unable to open my jaw. Ah the pain! Oh well, probably slept in a funny position, not to worry. Took a few ibuprofen and woke the next morning, it was worse: lockjaw for sure! It got a little better during the day, and not wanting my doctor to think I am neurotic, I held off til Saturday morning, suffering every night, before asking his opinion. My father, a doctor, used to always say that for neurotics, "A few good diagnostic tests are often the finest cure." I didn't want my doctor thinking that about me, Lord knows!
Luckily I had preserved a tick the size of a poppy seed in a napkin, having written on it "Deer Tick? June 5, 2008, found behind my ear" then stuck it in a Ziplock. My family, one and all, had squinted their eyes and sized the little thing up, assuring me it was not a tick. The doctor took a light and a magnifying glass to it and said yes, it's a tick, but it's intact, you're fine. "Wait a few days," he said, "and see what happens."
By Tuesday of this week, no relief. I felt a little feverish. I had researched TMJ, Lyme Disease, bone and thyroid cancer, arthritis, the works. The doctor ordered a TMJ xray, a hard one to get. It took the technician a few tries, increasing my exposure and making me wish I had fought the insurance company to go straight to an MRI.
So I got the xray Tuesday night after the radiologist had gone home, and I would get the results on Wednesday. "But my doctor is off on Wednesdays!" I mouthed in sorrow. They said "If it's an emergency we'll contact the doctor through his answering service." He worked today, Thursday, but doesn't make his calls until dinnertime, of course. Still no call. Is he putting it off because it's not important or because it's the Big One, the news that's hard to break?
Oddly enough, in the past two days, while waiting for the results, and going about my daily business at work, dining out, and at home, taking my temperature now and again, I have heard not one but two tales of people hospitalized for infections in their jaw and head that resulted from root canals gone wrong years after the fact.
I have never even considered going to the dentist! The pain in my jaw and under my ear, seemed so far removed from my mouth! But after all, really, how far is your mouth from your jaw? I mean, forget what your brain thinks: just look in the mirror.
It's probably that. Instead of panicking and thinking big, I should have thought small. Now the dentist is on vacation.
And so now I'm off to the opera at my local movie theater, a high-definition presentation of Puccini's La Rondine from Teatro La Fenice in Venice. I have found some old expired codeine- (never believe expiration dates!) So off I go- the doctor will have to wait to tell me what it is I long to know. Just what the hell is this excruciating pain? A week has passed since it started. I could blame the medical establishment, but it's nobody's fault but mine. He who hesitates is lost. Oh God! Lost!? Farewell!
Addendum: The phone message from the doctor later tonight says it's a dislocated jaw, and next I need an MRI.
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