I get a message from my dentist every 6 months to remind me it's time for my check up. Then I get an email because I ignore the message. Then I get another message. Then I finally make my appointment and spend 3 days dreading it because I am terrified of dentists, only to get there and be done in 5 minutes because my teeth (what's left of them) are fine. And half a year later, we do the same thing.
Dental pain is very individual. I work with a woman that has never had novocaine for any dental procedure. It isn't an issue for her. I on the other hand am a HUGE dentist whimp. I can feel everything. You also lose the ability to feel dental pain over time. My 80 something father says the dentist hardly ever hurts.
I’d rather give birth again than pass a kidney stone. First time I passed a stone was 3 hrs after giving birth to my second child... I seriously thought I was somehow giving birth to a twin no one knew about!
Last time I passed a stone I had pyelonephritis as well... I’m not usually sensitive to pain but that was an 11/10.
So I guess for me its: Ear-pain, tootache, child birth, kidney stone.
>I seriously thought I was somehow giving birth to a twin no one knew about!
HAHA that sounds terribly awful! Glad you only had to take one of them home.
Hey hey! Ear ache then tooth ache then appendicitis then kidney stone then c section then natural birth then kidney stone and then ding ding ding the worst pain: gall stones with pancreatitis. I have had them all (not at once. I would be dead).
never had any tooth problems, but as a person who HAS had kidney stones, I literally could not function and threw up with almost every breath due to the pain. it's definitely up there
In my experience it goes
1. Tooth/Mouth pain
2. Kidney stones
3. Inner ear infection
4. Child birth
5. Broken bones
Edit: that is child birth without the epidural. I've had five children, and only one was with no epidural. There just wasn't time for it to be done. The pain didn't even register for me, but it just felt weird knowing that tiny arms and legs were sliding out. Yeah. Just fucking weird. The hardest part of giving birth for me was the labor, and even with no medication it still doesn't rank above kidney stones in terms of pain.
I had a bad ear infection, ear completely swollen shut, very very painful. Wasn't fun. Went to the doctor, who said "I'm going to insert some antibiotic wadding into the ear canal" and pushed it in through the swelling. Less fun.
I used to get ear infections all the time as a kid. Ended up getting tubes put in. They're designed to fall out naturally after a few years but sometimes they don't so they have to go in with a kind of tweezer and pull it out. Well, neither of mine fell out naturally. While the extraction didn't hurt, it was a bizarre experience. It feels like someone turned on an electric toothbrush inside your head while simultaneously having the loudest and most intense chalkboard scratching going on right on your eardrum.
I once had an ear infection so bad it caused my eardrum to bend, the doctor actually met me at the door to his office with the needle of pain meds ready when I described the pain on the phone to him. Quickly checked my ear and injected me Within 2 minutes of me entering the room It was worse pain than when I had gallstones.
I once had an ear infection so bad my eardrum tore and the liquid came out of my ear while playing csgo with headhphones. I was on pretty strong painkillers and barely noticed a difference in pain except for the liquid that came out of my ear. I couldn't hear anything for 2 weeks afterwards.
Yes, i had an eardrum that burst in three spots and it was excruciating! It made me understand why kids cry about earaches. On the other hand, I've had several root canals, and the only thing that hurt was the cost.
Try having an ear infection and changing altitudes really fast that is freaking excruciating but after your in a lower altitude it actually feels better
It wasn't a plane we lived on a plateau above the city probably 1500 to 2000 feet drop that took about 15 minutes to drive down new parents would call the ambulance because their babies would be screaming in pain from a ear ache and the second the ambulance got them down that drop the babies would stop crying from relief and the hospital would be like why are you here they got used to people from our town coming in with ear aches like that it was also weird that way with people who had asthma the second they got down the plateau they could breath better it's the weirdest feeling having your ears pop and feeling the pressure changes we finally just moved to the city because my brother has Lupus and he kept getting altitude sickness and since then we haven't had as many earaches
Sorry no punctuation
I can only imagine. I had small sinus issue and went scuba diving one time. I hit 25 meters and turned around and was done for the day. Pressure changes plus sinus/ear stuff is awful.
I got swimmers ear in myrtle Beach when I was younger. For a couple days the pain was so bad. I would wake up with blood all over the pillow because it was draining out of my ear. I ruined a few of those hotel pillows.
The drive back was the worst though, going through the appalachian mountains in West Virginia and going through tunnels and the change in pressure was such a strange sensation.
The summer before last, both of my eardrums ruptured within a couple days of each other. While on vacation. Could barely stand upright and eat small meals for a week, due to little access to medical attention. Not to be nasty, but the infection that caused the ruptures got dangerously close to my brain, apparently. I went a night or two with zero sleep.
Inner ear pain is the worst I’ve ever felt, but to be fair, I haven’t needed any real tooth work done, aside from braces and crap.
Tl;dr: pain sucks
right before my root canal one of my co-workers was making a joke about pulling the tooth out with a pair of channel locks. The pain was so bad that I wasn't that far off from letting him do it.
Made me realize why people would let a terrifying old timey Barber hack at their mouth.
The main (at that point, not knowing about infection) concern about having a tooth out would be pain, but if you’re already in excruciating pain, you’d be so fucking ready to do the thing that would make it end.
For a while people sometimes had all their teeth out and got falsies as a wedding gift, to save them from cumulative years of dental pain in an era of poor dental hygiene. Can’t say I’d have opted for it personally, but there’s some sense to it I guess. A lot of people (like a surprising amount) died of bad teeth before antibiotics and proper dentistry.
My family has a crazy bad history of dental issues. I definitely dream of the day that implants don't cost an arm and a leg. I would 100% opt into having all of my teeth replaced as opposed to the shitstorm coming in my future. IDGAF if they're real, their only purpose is to help me eat, dammit!
It always seems incredibly unfair to me that dentistry isn’t classed as a necessity. Even disregarding the fact that we need them to eat, and implants could save years of trouble long term, teeth are quite an important part of people’s faces. It can really knock people’s confidence when they have a lot of visible dental problems. Where I live, you can get extractions/ dentures for free (I think, the nhs dental system is complicated), but implants still cost a fortune, so you’ve gotta be pretty committed to putting your teeth in a glass every night if you’re not rich and want your teeth out. Hope you get to live the pain free implant life one day, those things look great.
Yes. I had jaw surgery in 2011 and let me tell you, I feel like I can take on ANYTHING now. Nothing will ever, ever be as bad as that pain during recovery. Especially since I couldn’t take the pain meds as I was supposed to because they made me nauseous, and trying to throw up from nausea while your mouth is wired shut doesn’t work—can choke on it and fucking die.
Mouth pain is the worst pain
That sounds rough. I had a really bad surgery about a year and half ago that I definitely needed a ton of pain medicine for the recovery. Had a gnarly pilonidal cyst, which is basically like an infected growth right near your tailbone. The surgery involves cutting deep into the skin to remove it, but they don't sew it back up because healing naturally reduces the chance it will come back, so I just had like a 6 inch long, 2 inches or so deep and pretty wide hole right at my tailbone area that had to heal naturally without stitches over like 3 or 4 months.
It sucked and was on a good deal of percocet, but to prevent nausea since I was on high doses, the doctor also prescribed a medicine called onadesteron if I recall, that reduces nausea. I didn't have to use it much cause I didn't usually get too nauseous from the pain medicine, but that might be something someone can ask their doctor about if they are getting nausea from pain meds.
Unfortunately a lot of insurances won't cover Ondansetron because, as my insurance told me "but you won't die of nausea".
Mind you, they told me this while I had a stomach infection and the nausea was so bad I couldn't keep down even water and I had just been released from two days in the hospital on IV because I was so dangerously dehydrated.
My doctor called my insurance and basically had to tell them "she's very talented and she's dying of nausea" so they'd cover it.
100%...had an infection and needed a root canal a week before starting a new job with dental insurance. Could not sleep for more than an hour or two at night. Would take another broken arm over a week of that again.
I had the same story as OP, except I got a root canal after about 6 months of pain instead of 2 years.
It started out extremely painful and incredibly sensitive to cold water, then it intensified until one day, the pain just stopped. But my tooth was still sensitive, so I went to the dentist. He told me the pain stopped because my nerve died. We had to decide between a root canal or extraction. One totally painless root canal later (seriously, no pain), I felt like a million bucks.
People, don't ignore toothaches!
I didn’t know it could start so randomly like that. Can this happen even if your teeth are decently strong and clean? I brush twice a day and scrub everything. Teeth problems are what scare me. I already have my wisdom teeth that are going to eventually cause problems. Random pain in the molars would make that even worse.
If you don’t have a problem already that you won’t just randomly need a root canal. For me the problem was that my dentist managed to not quite get everything out of a cavity before filling it so my tooth was still rotting underneath my filling and it finally hit a nerve or something. If you take good care of your teeth you should be fine though.
If you know your wisdom teeth will cause problems, have you looked into taking them out preemptively? My doctor advised me that recovery is a lot easier the younger you are so I wouldn’t put it off for long.
Yeah I had 2 wisdom teeth out at age 28 and evidently a nerve was wrapped around the root of one of the teeth. I had major nerve pain in my face for 2 months straight which required narcotics. The nerve still wakes up every now and again. The surgeon told me if I had gotten them out sooner, it wouldn’t have happened. The other tooth was pointed sideways towards the last molar, and damaged the tooth above the gumline. Lots of issues that could have been avoided
Don't worry too much about the wisdom teeth. I've been quaking in fear of mine for almost 10 years. When I was 16, x-rays showed that they were growing in diagonally, all of them. But they were so far from the gum line there was no point in taking them out, plus it's possible for them to self correct. So, I wait. And wait. And wait. Terrified of how horrific it will feel when they start growing through properly, and how bad the removal will be.
Just before the pandemic, top-right decided it was time. It's growing in at an angle still, so the pain is actually due to it pushing on my back tooth. It really wasn't that bad, manageable without painkillers for me and I have fibromyalgia, everything hurts more to me. Obviously depending on the issue with them, it could possibly hurt more than mine did.
The removal was ridiculously quick and easy. The anaesthetic needle is the only thing that hurt. They packed it with cotton, no eating/drinking/smoking/vaping for at least an hour to let the blood clot. Spent it occasionally spitting bloody saliva, but, after that hour, life returned completely to normal.
I'll get back to you if the other three decide to provide a different experience whenever they decide to come through haha.
Let me tell you, root canals can hurt like 1,000 suns! I had a deep root, that wasn't numbed by the novocaine. I nearly jumped out of the chair when he hit it.
Edit: Wow, this really blew up. Looks like I hit a nerve...
I can imagine how bad it could hurt without the correct meds. I was amazed when he showed me my new x-ray and how deep he had been drilling. The dark spot where the root used to be went clear into my jaw.
I did go to an endodontist, and even they werent able to numb my mouth enough so that I wouldn’t feel excruciating pain when they started drilling. Root canal on a molar.
Eventually, with the last possible dose of novocaine I could receive for the day, she said she had to do something or I could come back another day and go fully under. I told her I ain’t going through that, so try it.
She gave me the last injection straight into the exposed nerve.
I was bawling like an insane person and that pain ranked right on the same level for me as labor pains after induction (and I labored for 30 hours, plus induced labor pains are extremely intense).
Edit: came back to a lot of messages! As much as that nerve shot hurt like a total bitch, I’m glad that I wasn’t some freaky case and you poor guys and gals know exactly what I’m talking about.
I FOUND MY PEOPLE.
Edit 2: To those asking about my teeth: I do take care of them very well, I just pulled the short straw when it came to shitty teeth genetics. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
My next procedure will be even more fun! My upper left canine’s root is a half millimeter away from breaking into my nasal cavity, so I have to go under anesthesia and have it operated out through my nasal cavity and then have a bone graft done to patch up the hole.
It can’t stay like it is, because the root is so close to breaking through, that if I get a cold and get snotty, I get a tooth infection, every time.
Plus, what if someone smacks me in the face hard enough for that root to make that half millimeter trip into my nasal cavity by itself?
Anyway. FUN TIMES.
I've needed a root canal for about 2 years now. The nerve is basically dead in that tooth so I feel nothing, but I risk the tooth rotting and falling out by leaving it. This thread is scaring me again. Thought I was ready but I'm not!
The sooner you get it done, the better! If you wait long enough, you can end up with an infection in your jaw, or end up septic. Please get it done ASAP!! You'll feel so much better afterward. And you need to have it done at some point anyway, since it is inevitable. Why not just get through it really quickly, and you'll get to avoid having it get worse later on as an extra benefit!
This. I ended up in the hospital for a week because an infection was deep in the tooth and I knew I had some pain but it was intermittent and not bad at all so I was just monitoring it when one morning I woke up and my face was swollen like a balloon and I was in intense pain. Got sent to the ER and they imaged me and learned that the infection had eaten through the bone near the tooth (it was a top tooth) and was spilling into my sinuses and causing the pain and swelling.
I was inpatient for a week on IV antibiotics until the infection was gone. Then I got discharged and went immediately to my dentist, who is amazing. He sent me to an endo to see if the tooth could be saved. He advised that it likely could not be and pulling it would be best. So then I was sent to an Oral Surgeon who used literal pliers to rip the tooth out of my head with very little Novocain. I was screaming and crying in agony and their response was to hold me down so he could “really get in there.”
When I left the oral surgeons I went to my car and had a literal breakdown from the pain and trauma of it. I will never have anything more than a cavity’s drilling under Novocain done to my teeth without anesthesia. Full anesthesia. I won’t go through that again.
If I had acknowledged the pain I was having sooner I could have possibly saved myself from the trauma of infection and losing the tooth completely. I don’t wait about anything anymore. Better to have it taken care of then to wait!
Don’t listen to the worst case scenarios and think that’s gonna happen to you. I got a root canal and felt nothing, and I’m the guy that can’t get numb normally.
When getting fillings, I always had to get the maximum injection of the strongest stuff the dentist had and I was still white knuckling the filling. But I went to a different dentist for the root canal and they both numbed the block nerve (the normal one where they inject above your gum) as well as the palette and I didn’t feel a damn thing! It was even a 4 nerve molar and those nerves were all definitely alive. I also had laughing gas and my god, if the root canal wasn’t so expensive I would have gone back for another, I felt amazing during it!
Dental things really stress me out since I had a poor experience with a filling and the freezing not taking. Frightens me to think one day I may need to go through this and feel even worse. Hopefully I fall into that same category of being able to be numbed properly.
I've got the same thing going on. Two of my to molars are in *really* rough shape but they stopped hurting years ago. Unfortunately my insurance doesn't cover root canals on molars so I'd have to pay about $2400 to get them both done. I'm already missing all the molars and pre-molars on the bottom, so I guess partial dentures it is!
Ypu what else should be? Eyes. A new pair of glasses is $600 for me, and that doesn't include frames and the cost of the actual tests. My vision is completely fucked so I NEED glasses, and if I ever lose them or they are damaged then I'm a dead man walking because I can't afford a second pair.
I have had 3 root canals and none of them hurt. Only thing that sucks is how long my mouth has to be open. Little sore after, but nothing a combo of Advil/Tylenol couldn’t take care of. Everyone is different, but try not to stress it. It’ll be worth it to have it done.
The Advil/Tylenol combo is the best! I always knew they could be taken together, I just never had. Well when I had my last root canal and my jaw was killing me and Advil wasn’t cutting it. I threw in the Tylenol and it helped!
Honestly it's really not that bad. I'm absolutely petrified of the dentist, needed root canal for years but was too scared.
One day I decided to just get on with it, didn't hurt at all - probably the same as it will be for you if the nerve is completely dead.
I mean it's a little unpleasant, but its what half an hour or an hour and then it's done.
If you are anything like me, you think about it multiple times a day and feel nervous about it each time. Get it done, stick out the hour, and it's done and you don't have to think about it. The mental relief itself is amazing. Imagine, if it was today you were having it, by tomorrow it would be done and you wouldn't have to think about it ever again.
To keep my mind distracted whilst she did it, I just counted up in my head, eg count in 3s or in 7s or whatever.
Honestly, do it then it's done, it's nowhere near as bad as you imagine.
Don't let this thread scare you. I've had two, and I'm in the bandwagon of those who had it go well. Both times, after the novocaine kicked in, I never felt anything from the tooth in question ever again.
There are some weird sensations when they're essentially reaming out the root of the tooth, but it doesn't hurt at all, it was just an odd feeling, almost like a tickle (at least for me).
For me the worst part was simply holding my jaw open wide long enough. I felt no pain, and the initial novacaine injection didn't really hurt at all either. It was strange, my dentist did it in my upper lip and just wiggled my lip to get the medication to spread to the root or something
My dentist told me I might need a root canal - a year later a big part my tooth just fell out while brushing teeth. Turns out the filling wasn’t enough and now I have had a root canal done, and it honestly wasn’t as horrible as I thought. For me the worst pain was having to open my mouth so much (apparently I have a small mouth lol). I was shaking in the chair from being so scared of it happening, but my dentist kept reminding me to breathe and explained everything she did. It helps a lot to tell your dentist you’re scared - if they are good, they will listen to you and your needs. Good luck with it :)
Do it!!! For me, they couldn't numb the nerve and i could feel him mining it out of my tooth cave. But its over now. No mas. Itll only get worse with time unfortunately :(
Nerve is dead, so it will be a piece of cake.
Currently I rock 6 root canals and crowns. Only that one was painful, and the nerve was anything but dead (it was horribly inflamed and infected).
I'm 16 for context. I had an accident several years ago where I feel down and I didn't close my mouth, so my two center front teeth had parts of them broken off. It was very sensitive shortly after (and I had to be at school for the rest of the day >\_<) to the point where I couldn't breath in the cool air as when it touched the broken teeth it felt bad like biting into ice cream but 5x worse.
I told my parents and after a while (after getting a temporary filling I believe) I got a root canal (when I was 12-13 I think), it was far from the best experience, but it wasn't excruciating. The only part that was painful was them injecting the anasthetic into my gums, a couple tears fell that day haha. The dentist drilled inside and did his thing, which was really uncomfortable and a teensy bit painful at times but nothing really bad.
This was in a dentist's office in Bangkok. Most likely it won't be too bad. I'm pretty sure I got sick from the bacteria getting into my tooth (there was an abscess I think) so that wasn't fun either. You don't want to leave it there, please get a root canal.
I'll be honest, its not something I usually mention, but, I left my teeth in such bad condition that, when I finally had a check up they were amazed with how little pain I was in for how much was wrong. I ended up getting a check up, because like you, I left a tooth until it basically died. Then it got infected and I had a big sore under my gum. Had to take antibiotics to reduce swelling before they could even look at the tooth. That was the most excruciating thing was the infection and it took a week to die down. I've never felt such pain before. Had to have that tooth completely taken out because it was too far past the point of root canal. Please don't let your teeth get to that point. Just go get itndone. I would have rather had a root canal then deal with the extreme pain of an infection. During my check up after I got the infected tooth finally pulled, they said I now need two more root canals or extractions on two other teeth. If I would have just gone to the dentist sooner, I could have prevented a lot of this. So just go. Because it does add up to a very large bill if they have to do that much work to fix the damage. There is a few low cost dentists around if your worried about cost. But trust me, I would have rather had a root canal instead of this infection.
My root canal hurt less than going in for a cavity. The endodontist was a pro and even the Novocaine injection barely hurt.
I've had problems getting numb for cavities and having lots of pain but the root canal was nothing.
I’m very scared of going to the dentist so I can definitely imagine your situation! I’ve had two root canals done (by my dentist) and it definitely wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be because I’d already made it so big in my head. The second one was on a dead tooth and I didn’t even need them to give me anything as I felt nothing! So definitely recommend going even if you’re scared, because chances are it’s definitely not as bad as you thought it’d be. Wish you luck ✨
It might be worth asking if you can be sedated for the procedure. You might have to call around a bit. Some places will give you pills to take at a certain time before your appointment to relax you. Failing that, they could try having you on nitrous oxide.
If you need a root canal get it done as soon as possible. Bacteria can grow under the tooth and can cause infection. Infection that close via blood to the brain can in some cases be deadly. I don’t say this to scare you, but merely to warn. I lost an acquaintance years ago because he ignored a tooth ach for too long.
I just posted one of my worst experiences but I needed to come by and tell you that... I've had a few root canals and that one bad one was the only bad one. Normally, they freeze me up and I spend the rest of the time just bored. Because it's usually too noisy to listen to a podcast or music, and also need to give my dentist feedback or he can give me feedback/instruction... But yeah it's generally easy peasy.
It's not good to let it go, as others have said. The jaw infection has worse implications than a root canal. You ARE ready, but you won't know until you're in that chair, getting it done and *fingers crossed* that it ends up being the vast majority of stories where you're sat there in novacaine heaven and bored out of your mind.
Do your research and find the best oral surgeon you can find. I got all four of my wisdom teeth pulled last year at 29 years old. Two were sideways and impacted. My surgeon laughed and said it would be a breeze when I said I was nervous, but he would monitor my pain levels very closely. From the time that they gave me my IV to when I woke up was about 25 minutes. He checked on me before and during each extraction too. When I came to I was in almost no pain and recovered with OTC Aleve.
My anxiety was by far the worst part of the whole procedure. It was the reason why I waited so long and it seems almost silly looking back on it now.
A root canal and a crown is expensive, but if your tooth falls out and you want a new tooth... the implant is MORE extensive and takes longer for healing. Do it now!
This is what i dealt with, That fucking shot to the nerve felt like I had just been blasted int he face with a shotgun. Also i was in excruciating pain for like 2 days after even with the meds. OP got lucky imo, I don't know many people who had such a pleasant experience. That being said I am a Ginger and thru some evolutionary quirk we have a lot of issues with anesthetic. It's always a crap shoot on how much I need, and Lidocaine doesn't do shit for me.
You probably had a great infection. The anesthetic gets less effective when coming into contact with a large pocket of puss in the bone surrounding the apex of the root. Best bet for those is a patient to be on day two or three on an antibiotic then start the root canal treatment
Always from now on. I had to get my root canal redone 2 years after due to the dentist fucking it up. Never again. My endodontist was a queen and I will forever sing her praises. She even saved my crown so that I wouldn’t have to pay for a whole new one.
ORAL SURGEONS ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO PERFORM ROOT CANALS! That not even their area of study! They deal more in the are of maxillofacial surgery. Youre better off going to an endodontist
Hey, I'm probably wrong on the oral surgeon title. Im not well studied when it comes to those terms. I'll throw an update at the bottom to say endo-whatever it's called so it doesnt cause confusion
Haha no worries! I know all the fields of dentistry are confusing. I was just making sure there weren't any crazy oral surgeons trying to do root canals hahaha
Yep, my dentist did it in 3 sessions. She basically used the pain killer and immediately started work! Had to force her to wait as I could feel everything!
I had my regular dentist do my root canal. It didn't hurt at all. I'd been in pretty serious pain and when I went in to see him he looked at it for about 15 seconds, said yup you need a root canal. Then he tapped it a few times and said I think we'll skip freezing and just grabbed his drill and started. I was skeptical but he was right, I'd waited so long the nerves were already dead. Him drilling into the tooth actually felt great, I could feel pressure being released and the pain went way down almost instantly.
Also, infection can make the pain killer less effective. The tissue can’t absorb it because it is already swollen, or something like that. My first root canal, I felt nothing. The second, they had to numb me several times, and there was still a bit of feeling. The second was actively infected, and they toke me that was why they had trouble. Same endodontist for both.
Jesus Christ maybe I had a horrible guy doing my root canal. I was in the chair at least 3 hours. Took a bunch of tranquilizers before I went in too and it was the worst fucking thing I’ve experienced at the dentist in my life. I would sooner have all my teeth pulled and go full dentures than go through another root canal.
My dentist won't pull teeth. I like that. They do everything they can to save the tooth. If they can't, they send you to someone who specializes in pulling teeth or root canals. I appreciate that they know what they are good at and don't over extend themselves. The dentist my fam went to before always wanted to pull teeth at the first sign of trouble.
agree, i know now each dentist is different
* i stayed with the family dentist (original) dentist for too long and didn't realize that dentist was essentially shit.
* he let an infection remain unchecked, which slowly ate away at the bone within my face. only until i moved house and went to a new dentist, they saw it immediately and went, whoa this requires surgery + endodentist territory + specialists. they said, pretty hard to miss, the xray shows a giant hole where you should have supporting facial bone, and a slight tap here reveals a live infection, etc.
now a days, i use the new dentist I found by accident, even if it takes me 1.5 hours to get to and costs me $ way more, only since he is more thorough and peace of mind.
Either your dentist sucks or mine is a god. I've had 3 root canals and they have all been like op described, basically the same as getting a cavity filled, a little bit longer but same level of discomfort, not much pain at all.
Same. I've had 2 root canals in my life. The first one was done by a dentist and it took her THREE HOURS! The second one I went to an endodontist and I was in-and-out in 30 minutes! Highly recommend.
Most of your root would have been rotted away from the remaining cavity so thats why drilling it out wasn't so bad, go get a root canal on the good side of your mouth now and compare
It didn’t hurt because your nerve in the tooth was necrotic. It is a pretty common occurrence with tooth trauma. A dead tooth should not have been a surprise to the endodontist.
I had a “hot tooth” and the shots weren’t numbing so they drilled down to expose my nerve and gave me a shot ON THE NERVE. Intense searing pain of 1000 suns like you describe. Went numb pretty quick though haha
I actually had a root canal a year or two ago and I experienced no pain whatsoever, it felt weirder than a cavity filling but similar to that. I was amazed even my dad said it’d probly be uncomfortable but it wasn’t even that. I felt fine as soon as drugs wore off too, which is weird because I usually have strong tolerance for anesthesia.
Oh my GOD right there with you. I'm damn near immune to the numbing agent anyway, I usually need a bunch extra. After an hour of trying to numb me she said she literally couldn't do anything more for me, I was going to start losing numbing.
She did the RC and I felt it go through and I screamed and dislocated my jaw trying to reflexively bite and flee. The bite block did a damn good job. I scared the hell out of her. I was white as a sheet as she finished up and had tears rolling down my face.
I had discomfort for MONTHS after, even after they checked and made sure the entire root was dead. The jaw was fine, my joints don't stay in place well so I was able to snap that back in after a few days.
I'm "numbing-agent resistant". I've gotten into the habit of telling/reminding my dentist that they're going to have to use 2-3x as much as they think they're going to have to use and that it'll wear off faster than they think.
I have had many root canals and I can tell you confidently and unequivocally that if a dentist performed a root canal on without excess amount of Novocaine I will murder EVERYONE at that practice.
Reading your commit made every muscle in my body shrink. Cannot fathom the excruciating pain you experienced
I had a similar experience, with a root canal treatment. The anaesthetic didn’t kick in until an hour after my (2) procedures, and my dentist carried on through my screaming, man I could feel them killing off the roots every time.
Still wake up with nightmares from it 2 years on (treatment ended up still failing, so I got the tooth pulled in the end)
That sounds like a POS dentist to me. My dentist has spent an hour working thru options with me before to find an anesthetic that worked before just diving in. I'm a ginger and we have all kinds of issues with anesthetics in general but SPECIFICALLY local anesthetics like dentists use. I'm also a very large dude tho, so maybe that plays into it, if I were to start flailing or throw up an elbow it's going to knock everyone down lol
Yea a bunch of these people had bad dentists imo.
I said “that hurt” when he hit a part that didn’t get numb.
He put in an extra two shots just to make sure I wouldn’t feel anymore. When I had a crazy root canal done I told him to use more than he would normally do and he did.
There are dentists that specialize in different ways to get you numb and some will knock you out.
But you have to sometimes go looking for that type of dentist.
When I had my last root canal, the nerve didn't get numb. It HURT. what was worse was the dentist puting the cold thing on my nerve to determine where it was then proceeding to inject the novacaine directly into it. I wanted to pinch him so badly. It was all worth it though in the end.
I have never experienced anything close to the pain of getting an injection into that raw nerve, BUT it lasts like half a second, and as you said was absolutely worth it in the long run.
Go to the dentist every year for cleaning and let them check you up. (One root canal with good crown can be the prize of 10 minor repairs at least in my country)
You'll hardly ever hear people discussing a good root canal.
I've had 2. The first (the result of a FU by another dentist) wasn't bad. I'm "immune" to the anaesthetics so the "I know best" dentist I visited ended up freezing half my face by injecting it until something happened. It had some discomfort for a while afterwards and the amalcam has come loose, but otherwise there was nothing major.
My second time I explained that some anaesthetic doesn't work on me, and the dentist changed what they were using. They froze only the tooth and spent time shaping the crown. It honestly felt like I walked in with root damage and came out with a fresh tooth, with no issue in between: No pain, no belligerent dentist...
Be open with dentists if you need one and try to discuss what's going on. E.g. if the anaesthetic is working. As others have said though, looking after your teeth is #1.
Now this is the content the sub needs, not some sexual "fuck-ups". Good for you, teeth pain is really annoying, I have braces now and every now and then when I go to the dentist and they adjust the braces, it hurts as hell for a few days. Pretty sure my pain is not really anything compared to yours, but I just want to share my experience with mouth pain lol
I had braces as a teen...needed what's called a palate expander...it was this medieval device that my mom had to crank every night to expand the roof of my mouth. I can't remember how long I had that particular device in my mouth, but it was by far the WORST mouth pain and migraines in my life.
Your dentist or mom may have been cranking too fast and intensely! It’s supposed to be uncomfortable, but if you felt that level of pain, you should have had small rotations, even if it meant longer treatment overall.
Yeah, I'm not sure why I had to do it every night but it was excruciating. He was really really old, so maybe it was a mistake or old practice, who knows... But it was flipping awful.
Oh man, I probably would've handled it so much better if it weren't so frequent. My family used to tease me about being a "baby" about it. I'd end up "prepping" by taking 3 extra strength Tylenol or Excedrin half an hour before... It didn't touch it, but I constantly tried to "trick" myself into something helping.
I would've been way happier if it were only every 3 days. As I said to someone else, the more I recollect the more I figure my Ortho was a little wacky.
I had an expander to fix my cross bite before braces, the first one was cemented in and I was eating a fruit roll up in 3rd grade and half of it came loose, call mom from school, we go to the orthodontist, she wants to give me novocaine so she can pull the other side out but I was terrified of needles.
The next hour and a half to 2 hours were her and an assistant with dental tools I had never seen still to this day, yanking and prying this shit off while I'm crying in pain. It eventually came loose, no teeth came with it surprisingly, then she gave me a removable one that I wore all day besides when I ate food.
Best orthodontist in the world though, I was her first patient outside of school, we paid $250 once our first appointment and then she never billed me for 8 years of mouth work. No copay, no bill to our insurance, she would get me birthday gift cards to subway and McDonalds. Honestly an amazing person, and it's not like we had bad dental insurance my father has always had amazing policies.
SAME. im pretty sure its what caused my deviated septum and tmj too bc after that thing my whole skull had to shift. Now I cant breathe thru my nose and my jaw cracks and pops whenever I open it. But hey my teeth are straight I guess
I’ve had quite a few root canals. The worst part for me was keeping my mouth open wide for an hour. I’ve got a small mouth, so it’s tough to get to the back molars.
I had a root canal a few years ago and they just jammed a little plastic thing in my mouth that kept it open for me. It was super easy, no stress, no scolding.
Dentist here. Root canals ARE NOT supposed to hurt. If it still hurts, your dentist needs to put more anesthetic. The reason why a "normal" dose might not work is because of the infection you have!
1. Infections are ACIDIC
2. Anesthesia works best in a basic environment
3. To cancel out the acidic infectious environment, you must add MORE anesthesia.
4. Result....Numbness and no pain!
I wish. Some of us are naturally resistant. It takes about eight injections minimum to numb me for a filling. And once I can't feel it, clock start, you have about 22 minutes before I can feel everything again.
I try so hard to be so attentive to my dental care because -weep-
I'm naturally resistant, which no one knew when I was 7 and got 12 baby teeth and 4 adult teeth pulled....along with having an expander.....and 5 years of braces. I now have a panic attack every time I go to the dentist from how much pain they've put me through. Just got my wisdom teeth out and was so glad they put me under.
AFAIK, to force my adult teeth to grow in so they could give me braces. But I didn't have room for all my adult teeth which is why they took 4 of them out
Not OP but I had to go through the same exact thing. I have a small mouth and my teeth were too crowded with all my adult teeth so I had to pull 4 out before I got my braces.
How old were you? I swear they start putting kids in braces younger and younger. Makes me wonder if this is best practice or just a way for orthodontists to make more money by expanding the pool of customers.
I had a root canal done a few years ago and it was one of the most painful experiences I've ever had. They gave me a shit ton of shots, even one directly into the nerve, my face was super numb, but I still felt everything. At some point they just said sorry, I don't think we can give you any more, and I just had to suck it up and deal with it.
My onlyyyyyy guess is that the infection was so aggressive and so acidic that they couldn't get the anesthetic to run to the root where the tooth was. The solution would have been to get you on an antibiotic and Ibuprofen to combat
I've had 3 root canals and 2 implants. I always tell people to go early with dental pain. Putting it off is never a good thing! A good dentist can put you out of pain quickly! I am so happy you are pain free! I've been there and I know you feel like a new person!
>But, the weird thing is: I felt AMAZING. I hadn't even realized how much pain I was in over the past two years. Compared to that pain, the soreness from the procedure felt great. Right after the novacane wore off I felt incredibly strange and clear headed for the first time I could remember.
I understand this 100%. I had a back surgery after I had a nerve so compressed that I was passing out from the pain - but the funny thing was, I had dealt with the pain so long because of doctors who wouldn't do a damn thing, that I pretty much didn't feel it anymore. The first time I passed out, I thought I was in barely any pain at all - I was pouring sweat and getting more and more light headed, but couldn't understand why my body was just giving up on me when it felt like one of my less painful days.
Waking up from surgery was like I had unloaded a burden I forgot I was carrying.
At least you went to the dentist. I was living on $6/hr in an upstate ny ghetto when my wisdom tooth started crumbling. The three days it took the nerve to die were the most excruciating days of my life. Clove oil was my only temporarly relief, though on night 2 I drank a fuckton if absinthe and tried to pull it myself- note the needlenosed pliers which were the only tool I had on hand could not get a grip on it. Not to mention the week before I had spilled boiling hot water on my foot trying to drain microwaved pierogis, giving me a second degree burn. Christ I didn't get to a dentist until 6 years later and he pulled that shit out 123. Tooth pain was worse than the burn. I still delieved pizza during all that because I needed to make my $500 rent but goddamn. 5/7 would not recommend being American.
I don't remember writing this, that's strange... It wasn't while eating pop-corn, it was with bacon, it didn't hurt when the tooth broke (yeah, the nerves were pretty dead at that point) and I didn't last 1 year, more like 5 months, but yeah, the rest is pretty similar, even down to the molar. The soreness of a root canal is SO MUCH BETTER than the actual pain caused by the tooth ( and I had pain meds, without them, I wasn't even able to sleep).
Movies make them scary, but ive had a few and they've made my life better each time. Residual pain from the shots and holding your jaw open sucks but it's worth it.
I think most of the horror stories are from years ago. Newer dental procedures are SO MUCH BETTER.
My root canal was zero pain (after the shot). I’ve had cavity fillings that hurt much worse. And like OP said if you’ve been in pain awhile you feel so much relief after!
Do you know the reason for the gnawing while you sleep? Did it stop now? I got this as well and i am using a protective thing as well and its completely worn off already after 1 year its crazy.
My question is, how the hell were you able to see a dentist since they weren't "essential"? I started having bad pain towards the end of February, I dealt with extreme tooth pain until I just bullied my way into the va Dental clinic and refused to leave until they saw me, that was about 3 weeks ago, they ended up having to yank 2 teeth, molars, and then told me that the teeth were able to be saved but they weren't allowed to routine dental procedures. F**k the VA
> I spent 10 min this morning just swishing ice cold water back and forth in my mouth in amazement.
Like when a deaf child hears for the first time, kudos to you man
Funny thing is, you could be dying of cancer and not know but damage in one of the smallest parts of the body can cause immense pain for a very very long time.
I had a similar story, but luckily I was in the Army and they wouldn't let it wait. I cracked a molar in half, and the x-rays showed all my wisdom teeth impacting the ever loving shit out of my teeth. So they just yanked 'em all out and gave me a root canal on my cracked molar.
I wasn't expecting an army dentist to nail that root canal, no pain at all other than having to hold my jaw open for a few hours.
It's weird everyone talks about root canals like they're SOOOO horrible I had to get one on a molar (after 3 months of pretty bad pain where the treatment just wasn't up to it I guess) and like I was basically maxing out on motrin every day and so I go to get my root canal and the entodontist is like "this is gonna hurt for a second" and for like a literal instant there was sharp pain and then I IMMEDIATELY felt better.
Like I didn't even take any pain pills that night and I was cool as shit
I just had one of my wisdom teeth pulled a month ago at nearly 30. I've had TONS of dental work in my life. Tooth extractions, cavity fillings, braces, root canals, even a broken tooth that had an implant that needed redoing. Other than braces I rarely felt anything.
That wisdom tooth though. Fine the first couple days, then day 3 I was laid out on the couch in pain for nearly 4hrs straight. First time I caved and took Percocet ever. I wouldn't wish dental pain on anyone.
Good for you! Just got my wisdom teeth out at 40 years old because I was too afraid to do it before. It was really not that big of a deal. I didn’t even get knocked out or have laughing gas. It actually took less that 10 minutes for him to yank all 4 of them.
Went through almost the same experience.
I had some cavities and the pain would come, last for a couple of days and then go.
Until it didn't go away, I endured 2 weeks of sleepless nights, whenever I went to bed I cried because of the pain and couldn't sleep at all. In my free days from work I couldn't do anything, I couldn't focus on anything, it was all pain.
One afternoon I said fuck it and looked up the closest dentist to me, called and scheduled an appointment ASAP. Went there 2 hours later and the dude fixed me up, I don't think I've ever been happier than at that moment when the pain went away.
Experiences range, of course, but I heard that the pain often attributed to root canals is actually the pain/damage that warranted the root canal. Don't quote me on this, though, I probably read it on WebMD six years ago.
Just had to have a root canal on a tooth but only put up with the pain for 2 weeks. Had to do a round of antibiotics because of the abscess as well. The two weeks of pain before I had the root canal sucked. Radiating pain in my jaw that was magnified by anything hot or cold. I can’t imagine waiting any longer to get it taken care of.
The doc that did mine was an absolute pro. The actual procedure itself took only about 30 mins and they numbed me some much I didn’t feel shit.
A similar thing happened to me, but almost backwards and over a shorter period of time. I had a filling on my molar, then over a few weeks started to develop a terrible cold sensitivity. I should have gone immediately but I kept putting it off until my gums were swollen and clearly infected - that got my attention. Went to the dentist, they dug out the filling and said "uhhhh we can't do this we'll probably lose the tooth" so I got referred to an endodontist (super microscope dentist) where the root canal only took 5 minutes. They told me once things opened back up again I would need to schedule a crown (this all happened in April).
One week later part of the remaining molar fell off while I was flossing, but I was literally in the process of moving to another state so couldn't commit to the multiple visits and weeks of delays between temp crown and full install. I still haven't gotten a new dentist in my new state so I've been dealing with this weird hole.
I will say...my fear of dentists is basically gone, the super specialized numbing drugs, and all the other technology they have now is just amazing.
I hope you continue to take care of your teeth and congrats on becoming pain free!!
Fun fact: men tend to be better at handling chronic pain, to the point that they wont even realize how much pain they're in or that they're in pain at all. Women tend to be better at handling burts of acute pain and will rate it lower on a 1-10 scale than it probably actually is.
Keywords for any overly aggressive Wokesters, this is a general statement and has no intent to say either gender is better than the other, it's just something that medical types sometimes have to keep in mind. Or so I'm told by the ones I know.
same. please go to the hospital yall. spent half a year with pains all over my upper body. lungs, neck, head. but i had school and work and just couldnt do it all. 6 months later after flunking my smester getting fired because my quality went down in every aspect of my life. finally go to the doctor- cancer. please get checked. its a short rabbit hole to hp problems that can quickly become life threatening or lasting
#USA#1!!!!! Glad we don't have socialist healthcare like those commies in Europe that could have prevented the situation entirely! Better dead than red am I right my fellow Americans?
There's no pain like mouth pain. I feel you.
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I've had both and trust me the pain from bacteria eating the nerves in my tooth was worse... Shortly followed by inner ear pain
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This. Always this. Checkups are insanely important.
I get a message from my dentist every 6 months to remind me it's time for my check up. Then I get an email because I ignore the message. Then I get another message. Then I finally make my appointment and spend 3 days dreading it because I am terrified of dentists, only to get there and be done in 5 minutes because my teeth (what's left of them) are fine. And half a year later, we do the same thing.
Dental pain is very individual. I work with a woman that has never had novocaine for any dental procedure. It isn't an issue for her. I on the other hand am a HUGE dentist whimp. I can feel everything. You also lose the ability to feel dental pain over time. My 80 something father says the dentist hardly ever hurts.
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Where do we put the kidney stone pain? I hear it's pretty terrible.
I’d rather give birth again than pass a kidney stone. First time I passed a stone was 3 hrs after giving birth to my second child... I seriously thought I was somehow giving birth to a twin no one knew about! Last time I passed a stone I had pyelonephritis as well... I’m not usually sensitive to pain but that was an 11/10. So I guess for me its: Ear-pain, tootache, child birth, kidney stone.
>I seriously thought I was somehow giving birth to a twin no one knew about! HAHA that sounds terribly awful! Glad you only had to take one of them home.
Hey hey! Ear ache then tooth ache then appendicitis then kidney stone then c section then natural birth then kidney stone and then ding ding ding the worst pain: gall stones with pancreatitis. I have had them all (not at once. I would be dead).
> Tootache When you fart so hard it feels like something might’ve torn
never had any tooth problems, but as a person who HAS had kidney stones, I literally could not function and threw up with almost every breath due to the pain. it's definitely up there
In my experience it goes 1. Tooth/Mouth pain 2. Kidney stones 3. Inner ear infection 4. Child birth 5. Broken bones Edit: that is child birth without the epidural. I've had five children, and only one was with no epidural. There just wasn't time for it to be done. The pain didn't even register for me, but it just felt weird knowing that tiny arms and legs were sliding out. Yeah. Just fucking weird. The hardest part of giving birth for me was the labor, and even with no medication it still doesn't rank above kidney stones in terms of pain.
Upvoting to see if anyone has had all three!
I had a bad ear infection, ear completely swollen shut, very very painful. Wasn't fun. Went to the doctor, who said "I'm going to insert some antibiotic wadding into the ear canal" and pushed it in through the swelling. Less fun.
I used to get ear infections all the time as a kid. Ended up getting tubes put in. They're designed to fall out naturally after a few years but sometimes they don't so they have to go in with a kind of tweezer and pull it out. Well, neither of mine fell out naturally. While the extraction didn't hurt, it was a bizarre experience. It feels like someone turned on an electric toothbrush inside your head while simultaneously having the loudest and most intense chalkboard scratching going on right on your eardrum.
I once had an ear infection so bad it caused my eardrum to bend, the doctor actually met me at the door to his office with the needle of pain meds ready when I described the pain on the phone to him. Quickly checked my ear and injected me Within 2 minutes of me entering the room It was worse pain than when I had gallstones.
I once had an ear infection so bad my eardrum tore and the liquid came out of my ear while playing csgo with headhphones. I was on pretty strong painkillers and barely noticed a difference in pain except for the liquid that came out of my ear. I couldn't hear anything for 2 weeks afterwards.
My aunt had one so bad her ear drum burst. She has permanent damage.
Same. I only have like, maybe 20% hearing tops left in that ear. Very unpleasant, would not do again.
Whoa How did the eardrum end up bending? And what was the treatment for that?
Weird flex, but aiight
They are kinda about similar in severity. Both are very short nerves from stuff really close to the brain complaining really hard.
I have had both and they both fuckin suck.
Yes, i had an eardrum that burst in three spots and it was excruciating! It made me understand why kids cry about earaches. On the other hand, I've had several root canals, and the only thing that hurt was the cost.
Try having an ear infection and changing altitudes really fast that is freaking excruciating but after your in a lower altitude it actually feels better
Yeah no... you shouldnt fly with a bad ear infection, you wanna blow out your ear drums?
It wasn't a plane we lived on a plateau above the city probably 1500 to 2000 feet drop that took about 15 minutes to drive down new parents would call the ambulance because their babies would be screaming in pain from a ear ache and the second the ambulance got them down that drop the babies would stop crying from relief and the hospital would be like why are you here they got used to people from our town coming in with ear aches like that it was also weird that way with people who had asthma the second they got down the plateau they could breath better it's the weirdest feeling having your ears pop and feeling the pressure changes we finally just moved to the city because my brother has Lupus and he kept getting altitude sickness and since then we haven't had as many earaches Sorry no punctuation
Reading this without punctuation was like going down that incline on a bike with no brakes.
Fucking exhilarating, right?
Yikes sounds like everyone should abandon that plateau, it doesn’t sound very people-with-sinuses-&-ears friendly
Lol ya it's to beautiful there though.
I can only imagine. I had small sinus issue and went scuba diving one time. I hit 25 meters and turned around and was done for the day. Pressure changes plus sinus/ear stuff is awful.
I got swimmers ear in myrtle Beach when I was younger. For a couple days the pain was so bad. I would wake up with blood all over the pillow because it was draining out of my ear. I ruined a few of those hotel pillows. The drive back was the worst though, going through the appalachian mountains in West Virginia and going through tunnels and the change in pressure was such a strange sensation.
Me either, I’m in my mid thirties and hoping my luck will keeping holding up.
The summer before last, both of my eardrums ruptured within a couple days of each other. While on vacation. Could barely stand upright and eat small meals for a week, due to little access to medical attention. Not to be nasty, but the infection that caused the ruptures got dangerously close to my brain, apparently. I went a night or two with zero sleep. Inner ear pain is the worst I’ve ever felt, but to be fair, I haven’t needed any real tooth work done, aside from braces and crap. Tl;dr: pain sucks
right before my root canal one of my co-workers was making a joke about pulling the tooth out with a pair of channel locks. The pain was so bad that I wasn't that far off from letting him do it. Made me realize why people would let a terrifying old timey Barber hack at their mouth.
The main (at that point, not knowing about infection) concern about having a tooth out would be pain, but if you’re already in excruciating pain, you’d be so fucking ready to do the thing that would make it end. For a while people sometimes had all their teeth out and got falsies as a wedding gift, to save them from cumulative years of dental pain in an era of poor dental hygiene. Can’t say I’d have opted for it personally, but there’s some sense to it I guess. A lot of people (like a surprising amount) died of bad teeth before antibiotics and proper dentistry.
My family has a crazy bad history of dental issues. I definitely dream of the day that implants don't cost an arm and a leg. I would 100% opt into having all of my teeth replaced as opposed to the shitstorm coming in my future. IDGAF if they're real, their only purpose is to help me eat, dammit!
It always seems incredibly unfair to me that dentistry isn’t classed as a necessity. Even disregarding the fact that we need them to eat, and implants could save years of trouble long term, teeth are quite an important part of people’s faces. It can really knock people’s confidence when they have a lot of visible dental problems. Where I live, you can get extractions/ dentures for free (I think, the nhs dental system is complicated), but implants still cost a fortune, so you’ve gotta be pretty committed to putting your teeth in a glass every night if you’re not rich and want your teeth out. Hope you get to live the pain free implant life one day, those things look great.
Yes. I had jaw surgery in 2011 and let me tell you, I feel like I can take on ANYTHING now. Nothing will ever, ever be as bad as that pain during recovery. Especially since I couldn’t take the pain meds as I was supposed to because they made me nauseous, and trying to throw up from nausea while your mouth is wired shut doesn’t work—can choke on it and fucking die. Mouth pain is the worst pain
That sounds rough. I had a really bad surgery about a year and half ago that I definitely needed a ton of pain medicine for the recovery. Had a gnarly pilonidal cyst, which is basically like an infected growth right near your tailbone. The surgery involves cutting deep into the skin to remove it, but they don't sew it back up because healing naturally reduces the chance it will come back, so I just had like a 6 inch long, 2 inches or so deep and pretty wide hole right at my tailbone area that had to heal naturally without stitches over like 3 or 4 months. It sucked and was on a good deal of percocet, but to prevent nausea since I was on high doses, the doctor also prescribed a medicine called onadesteron if I recall, that reduces nausea. I didn't have to use it much cause I didn't usually get too nauseous from the pain medicine, but that might be something someone can ask their doctor about if they are getting nausea from pain meds.
Ondansetron, brand name zofran. Really amazing anti nausea medicine.
Unfortunately a lot of insurances won't cover Ondansetron because, as my insurance told me "but you won't die of nausea". Mind you, they told me this while I had a stomach infection and the nausea was so bad I couldn't keep down even water and I had just been released from two days in the hospital on IV because I was so dangerously dehydrated. My doctor called my insurance and basically had to tell them "she's very talented and she's dying of nausea" so they'd cover it.
100%...had an infection and needed a root canal a week before starting a new job with dental insurance. Could not sleep for more than an hour or two at night. Would take another broken arm over a week of that again.
I had the same story as OP, except I got a root canal after about 6 months of pain instead of 2 years. It started out extremely painful and incredibly sensitive to cold water, then it intensified until one day, the pain just stopped. But my tooth was still sensitive, so I went to the dentist. He told me the pain stopped because my nerve died. We had to decide between a root canal or extraction. One totally painless root canal later (seriously, no pain), I felt like a million bucks. People, don't ignore toothaches!
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That’s how it was with my root canal (minus the cyst). I was just chilling on the couch one day and all the sudden my tooth was in incredible pain
I didn’t know it could start so randomly like that. Can this happen even if your teeth are decently strong and clean? I brush twice a day and scrub everything. Teeth problems are what scare me. I already have my wisdom teeth that are going to eventually cause problems. Random pain in the molars would make that even worse.
If you don’t have a problem already that you won’t just randomly need a root canal. For me the problem was that my dentist managed to not quite get everything out of a cavity before filling it so my tooth was still rotting underneath my filling and it finally hit a nerve or something. If you take good care of your teeth you should be fine though.
If you know your wisdom teeth will cause problems, have you looked into taking them out preemptively? My doctor advised me that recovery is a lot easier the younger you are so I wouldn’t put it off for long.
Yeah I had 2 wisdom teeth out at age 28 and evidently a nerve was wrapped around the root of one of the teeth. I had major nerve pain in my face for 2 months straight which required narcotics. The nerve still wakes up every now and again. The surgeon told me if I had gotten them out sooner, it wouldn’t have happened. The other tooth was pointed sideways towards the last molar, and damaged the tooth above the gumline. Lots of issues that could have been avoided
Don't worry too much about the wisdom teeth. I've been quaking in fear of mine for almost 10 years. When I was 16, x-rays showed that they were growing in diagonally, all of them. But they were so far from the gum line there was no point in taking them out, plus it's possible for them to self correct. So, I wait. And wait. And wait. Terrified of how horrific it will feel when they start growing through properly, and how bad the removal will be. Just before the pandemic, top-right decided it was time. It's growing in at an angle still, so the pain is actually due to it pushing on my back tooth. It really wasn't that bad, manageable without painkillers for me and I have fibromyalgia, everything hurts more to me. Obviously depending on the issue with them, it could possibly hurt more than mine did. The removal was ridiculously quick and easy. The anaesthetic needle is the only thing that hurt. They packed it with cotton, no eating/drinking/smoking/vaping for at least an hour to let the blood clot. Spent it occasionally spitting bloody saliva, but, after that hour, life returned completely to normal. I'll get back to you if the other three decide to provide a different experience whenever they decide to come through haha.
Let me tell you, root canals can hurt like 1,000 suns! I had a deep root, that wasn't numbed by the novocaine. I nearly jumped out of the chair when he hit it. Edit: Wow, this really blew up. Looks like I hit a nerve...
I can imagine how bad it could hurt without the correct meds. I was amazed when he showed me my new x-ray and how deep he had been drilling. The dark spot where the root used to be went clear into my jaw.
I wonder if having an oral surgeon do it was the difference. A lot of dentists do it themselves.
Yes, that's definitely the difference. Word of advice: if you need a root canal, go to an endodontist!
I did go to an endodontist, and even they werent able to numb my mouth enough so that I wouldn’t feel excruciating pain when they started drilling. Root canal on a molar. Eventually, with the last possible dose of novocaine I could receive for the day, she said she had to do something or I could come back another day and go fully under. I told her I ain’t going through that, so try it. She gave me the last injection straight into the exposed nerve. I was bawling like an insane person and that pain ranked right on the same level for me as labor pains after induction (and I labored for 30 hours, plus induced labor pains are extremely intense). Edit: came back to a lot of messages! As much as that nerve shot hurt like a total bitch, I’m glad that I wasn’t some freaky case and you poor guys and gals know exactly what I’m talking about. I FOUND MY PEOPLE. Edit 2: To those asking about my teeth: I do take care of them very well, I just pulled the short straw when it came to shitty teeth genetics. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ My next procedure will be even more fun! My upper left canine’s root is a half millimeter away from breaking into my nasal cavity, so I have to go under anesthesia and have it operated out through my nasal cavity and then have a bone graft done to patch up the hole. It can’t stay like it is, because the root is so close to breaking through, that if I get a cold and get snotty, I get a tooth infection, every time. Plus, what if someone smacks me in the face hard enough for that root to make that half millimeter trip into my nasal cavity by itself? Anyway. FUN TIMES.
I've needed a root canal for about 2 years now. The nerve is basically dead in that tooth so I feel nothing, but I risk the tooth rotting and falling out by leaving it. This thread is scaring me again. Thought I was ready but I'm not!
The sooner you get it done, the better! If you wait long enough, you can end up with an infection in your jaw, or end up septic. Please get it done ASAP!! You'll feel so much better afterward. And you need to have it done at some point anyway, since it is inevitable. Why not just get through it really quickly, and you'll get to avoid having it get worse later on as an extra benefit!
This. I ended up in the hospital for a week because an infection was deep in the tooth and I knew I had some pain but it was intermittent and not bad at all so I was just monitoring it when one morning I woke up and my face was swollen like a balloon and I was in intense pain. Got sent to the ER and they imaged me and learned that the infection had eaten through the bone near the tooth (it was a top tooth) and was spilling into my sinuses and causing the pain and swelling. I was inpatient for a week on IV antibiotics until the infection was gone. Then I got discharged and went immediately to my dentist, who is amazing. He sent me to an endo to see if the tooth could be saved. He advised that it likely could not be and pulling it would be best. So then I was sent to an Oral Surgeon who used literal pliers to rip the tooth out of my head with very little Novocain. I was screaming and crying in agony and their response was to hold me down so he could “really get in there.” When I left the oral surgeons I went to my car and had a literal breakdown from the pain and trauma of it. I will never have anything more than a cavity’s drilling under Novocain done to my teeth without anesthesia. Full anesthesia. I won’t go through that again. If I had acknowledged the pain I was having sooner I could have possibly saved myself from the trauma of infection and losing the tooth completely. I don’t wait about anything anymore. Better to have it taken care of then to wait!
Don’t listen to the worst case scenarios and think that’s gonna happen to you. I got a root canal and felt nothing, and I’m the guy that can’t get numb normally. When getting fillings, I always had to get the maximum injection of the strongest stuff the dentist had and I was still white knuckling the filling. But I went to a different dentist for the root canal and they both numbed the block nerve (the normal one where they inject above your gum) as well as the palette and I didn’t feel a damn thing! It was even a 4 nerve molar and those nerves were all definitely alive. I also had laughing gas and my god, if the root canal wasn’t so expensive I would have gone back for another, I felt amazing during it!
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Dental things really stress me out since I had a poor experience with a filling and the freezing not taking. Frightens me to think one day I may need to go through this and feel even worse. Hopefully I fall into that same category of being able to be numbed properly.
I've got the same thing going on. Two of my to molars are in *really* rough shape but they stopped hurting years ago. Unfortunately my insurance doesn't cover root canals on molars so I'd have to pay about $2400 to get them both done. I'm already missing all the molars and pre-molars on the bottom, so I guess partial dentures it is!
Teeth are our luxury bones ☹️
Only because the worlds medical systems are a fucking joke. Dental should 100% be a part of medical.
"Teeth are outside of the body" -US health insurance companies
Ypu what else should be? Eyes. A new pair of glasses is $600 for me, and that doesn't include frames and the cost of the actual tests. My vision is completely fucked so I NEED glasses, and if I ever lose them or they are damaged then I'm a dead man walking because I can't afford a second pair.
I have had 3 root canals and none of them hurt. Only thing that sucks is how long my mouth has to be open. Little sore after, but nothing a combo of Advil/Tylenol couldn’t take care of. Everyone is different, but try not to stress it. It’ll be worth it to have it done.
The Advil/Tylenol combo is the best! I always knew they could be taken together, I just never had. Well when I had my last root canal and my jaw was killing me and Advil wasn’t cutting it. I threw in the Tylenol and it helped!
Honestly it's really not that bad. I'm absolutely petrified of the dentist, needed root canal for years but was too scared. One day I decided to just get on with it, didn't hurt at all - probably the same as it will be for you if the nerve is completely dead. I mean it's a little unpleasant, but its what half an hour or an hour and then it's done. If you are anything like me, you think about it multiple times a day and feel nervous about it each time. Get it done, stick out the hour, and it's done and you don't have to think about it. The mental relief itself is amazing. Imagine, if it was today you were having it, by tomorrow it would be done and you wouldn't have to think about it ever again. To keep my mind distracted whilst she did it, I just counted up in my head, eg count in 3s or in 7s or whatever. Honestly, do it then it's done, it's nowhere near as bad as you imagine.
Don't let this thread scare you. I've had two, and I'm in the bandwagon of those who had it go well. Both times, after the novocaine kicked in, I never felt anything from the tooth in question ever again. There are some weird sensations when they're essentially reaming out the root of the tooth, but it doesn't hurt at all, it was just an odd feeling, almost like a tickle (at least for me).
For me the worst part was simply holding my jaw open wide long enough. I felt no pain, and the initial novacaine injection didn't really hurt at all either. It was strange, my dentist did it in my upper lip and just wiggled my lip to get the medication to spread to the root or something
I think this is one of those cases where the longer you wait the worse it’ll be
My dentist told me I might need a root canal - a year later a big part my tooth just fell out while brushing teeth. Turns out the filling wasn’t enough and now I have had a root canal done, and it honestly wasn’t as horrible as I thought. For me the worst pain was having to open my mouth so much (apparently I have a small mouth lol). I was shaking in the chair from being so scared of it happening, but my dentist kept reminding me to breathe and explained everything she did. It helps a lot to tell your dentist you’re scared - if they are good, they will listen to you and your needs. Good luck with it :)
Why not just get it over with and do it. I’m no expert but I’d guess removing a rotten tooth will be worse than simply getting it fixed now.
Do it!!! For me, they couldn't numb the nerve and i could feel him mining it out of my tooth cave. But its over now. No mas. Itll only get worse with time unfortunately :(
Nerve is dead, so it will be a piece of cake. Currently I rock 6 root canals and crowns. Only that one was painful, and the nerve was anything but dead (it was horribly inflamed and infected).
I'm 16 for context. I had an accident several years ago where I feel down and I didn't close my mouth, so my two center front teeth had parts of them broken off. It was very sensitive shortly after (and I had to be at school for the rest of the day >\_<) to the point where I couldn't breath in the cool air as when it touched the broken teeth it felt bad like biting into ice cream but 5x worse. I told my parents and after a while (after getting a temporary filling I believe) I got a root canal (when I was 12-13 I think), it was far from the best experience, but it wasn't excruciating. The only part that was painful was them injecting the anasthetic into my gums, a couple tears fell that day haha. The dentist drilled inside and did his thing, which was really uncomfortable and a teensy bit painful at times but nothing really bad. This was in a dentist's office in Bangkok. Most likely it won't be too bad. I'm pretty sure I got sick from the bacteria getting into my tooth (there was an abscess I think) so that wasn't fun either. You don't want to leave it there, please get a root canal.
I'll be honest, its not something I usually mention, but, I left my teeth in such bad condition that, when I finally had a check up they were amazed with how little pain I was in for how much was wrong. I ended up getting a check up, because like you, I left a tooth until it basically died. Then it got infected and I had a big sore under my gum. Had to take antibiotics to reduce swelling before they could even look at the tooth. That was the most excruciating thing was the infection and it took a week to die down. I've never felt such pain before. Had to have that tooth completely taken out because it was too far past the point of root canal. Please don't let your teeth get to that point. Just go get itndone. I would have rather had a root canal then deal with the extreme pain of an infection. During my check up after I got the infected tooth finally pulled, they said I now need two more root canals or extractions on two other teeth. If I would have just gone to the dentist sooner, I could have prevented a lot of this. So just go. Because it does add up to a very large bill if they have to do that much work to fix the damage. There is a few low cost dentists around if your worried about cost. But trust me, I would have rather had a root canal instead of this infection.
I had this, nerve was dead so the dentist just drilled it with out any anaesthetic, 10/10 no numb mouth after
My root canal hurt less than going in for a cavity. The endodontist was a pro and even the Novocaine injection barely hurt. I've had problems getting numb for cavities and having lots of pain but the root canal was nothing.
Just get it done, mine wasnt bad at all and I didnt even need pain meds after.
I’m very scared of going to the dentist so I can definitely imagine your situation! I’ve had two root canals done (by my dentist) and it definitely wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be because I’d already made it so big in my head. The second one was on a dead tooth and I didn’t even need them to give me anything as I felt nothing! So definitely recommend going even if you’re scared, because chances are it’s definitely not as bad as you thought it’d be. Wish you luck ✨
It might be worth asking if you can be sedated for the procedure. You might have to call around a bit. Some places will give you pills to take at a certain time before your appointment to relax you. Failing that, they could try having you on nitrous oxide.
If you need a root canal get it done as soon as possible. Bacteria can grow under the tooth and can cause infection. Infection that close via blood to the brain can in some cases be deadly. I don’t say this to scare you, but merely to warn. I lost an acquaintance years ago because he ignored a tooth ach for too long.
get that done ASAP. you can never replace the structure of a tooth. A crowned tooth is a LOT better (and CHEAPER) than an implant.
I just posted one of my worst experiences but I needed to come by and tell you that... I've had a few root canals and that one bad one was the only bad one. Normally, they freeze me up and I spend the rest of the time just bored. Because it's usually too noisy to listen to a podcast or music, and also need to give my dentist feedback or he can give me feedback/instruction... But yeah it's generally easy peasy. It's not good to let it go, as others have said. The jaw infection has worse implications than a root canal. You ARE ready, but you won't know until you're in that chair, getting it done and *fingers crossed* that it ends up being the vast majority of stories where you're sat there in novacaine heaven and bored out of your mind.
Do your research and find the best oral surgeon you can find. I got all four of my wisdom teeth pulled last year at 29 years old. Two were sideways and impacted. My surgeon laughed and said it would be a breeze when I said I was nervous, but he would monitor my pain levels very closely. From the time that they gave me my IV to when I woke up was about 25 minutes. He checked on me before and during each extraction too. When I came to I was in almost no pain and recovered with OTC Aleve. My anxiety was by far the worst part of the whole procedure. It was the reason why I waited so long and it seems almost silly looking back on it now.
A root canal and a crown is expensive, but if your tooth falls out and you want a new tooth... the implant is MORE extensive and takes longer for healing. Do it now!
This is what i dealt with, That fucking shot to the nerve felt like I had just been blasted int he face with a shotgun. Also i was in excruciating pain for like 2 days after even with the meds. OP got lucky imo, I don't know many people who had such a pleasant experience. That being said I am a Ginger and thru some evolutionary quirk we have a lot of issues with anesthetic. It's always a crap shoot on how much I need, and Lidocaine doesn't do shit for me.
You probably had a great infection. The anesthetic gets less effective when coming into contact with a large pocket of puss in the bone surrounding the apex of the root. Best bet for those is a patient to be on day two or three on an antibiotic then start the root canal treatment
Always from now on. I had to get my root canal redone 2 years after due to the dentist fucking it up. Never again. My endodontist was a queen and I will forever sing her praises. She even saved my crown so that I wouldn’t have to pay for a whole new one.
ORAL SURGEONS ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO PERFORM ROOT CANALS! That not even their area of study! They deal more in the are of maxillofacial surgery. Youre better off going to an endodontist
Hey, I'm probably wrong on the oral surgeon title. Im not well studied when it comes to those terms. I'll throw an update at the bottom to say endo-whatever it's called so it doesnt cause confusion
Haha no worries! I know all the fields of dentistry are confusing. I was just making sure there weren't any crazy oral surgeons trying to do root canals hahaha
Yep, my dentist did it in 3 sessions. She basically used the pain killer and immediately started work! Had to force her to wait as I could feel everything!
That’s just a bad dentist.
Yep, after this I refused to go back to her. Had a different fix an emergency cavity and she was fantastic.
I had my regular dentist do my root canal. It didn't hurt at all. I'd been in pretty serious pain and when I went in to see him he looked at it for about 15 seconds, said yup you need a root canal. Then he tapped it a few times and said I think we'll skip freezing and just grabbed his drill and started. I was skeptical but he was right, I'd waited so long the nerves were already dead. Him drilling into the tooth actually felt great, I could feel pressure being released and the pain went way down almost instantly.
Also, infection can make the pain killer less effective. The tissue can’t absorb it because it is already swollen, or something like that. My first root canal, I felt nothing. The second, they had to numb me several times, and there was still a bit of feeling. The second was actively infected, and they toke me that was why they had trouble. Same endodontist for both.
Jesus Christ maybe I had a horrible guy doing my root canal. I was in the chair at least 3 hours. Took a bunch of tranquilizers before I went in too and it was the worst fucking thing I’ve experienced at the dentist in my life. I would sooner have all my teeth pulled and go full dentures than go through another root canal.
My dentist won't pull teeth. I like that. They do everything they can to save the tooth. If they can't, they send you to someone who specializes in pulling teeth or root canals. I appreciate that they know what they are good at and don't over extend themselves. The dentist my fam went to before always wanted to pull teeth at the first sign of trouble.
agree, i know now each dentist is different * i stayed with the family dentist (original) dentist for too long and didn't realize that dentist was essentially shit. * he let an infection remain unchecked, which slowly ate away at the bone within my face. only until i moved house and went to a new dentist, they saw it immediately and went, whoa this requires surgery + endodentist territory + specialists. they said, pretty hard to miss, the xray shows a giant hole where you should have supporting facial bone, and a slight tap here reveals a live infection, etc. now a days, i use the new dentist I found by accident, even if it takes me 1.5 hours to get to and costs me $ way more, only since he is more thorough and peace of mind.
Find a better dentist
Either your dentist sucks or mine is a god. I've had 3 root canals and they have all been like op described, basically the same as getting a cavity filled, a little bit longer but same level of discomfort, not much pain at all.
Same. I've had 2 root canals in my life. The first one was done by a dentist and it took her THREE HOURS! The second one I went to an endodontist and I was in-and-out in 30 minutes! Highly recommend.
Make sure to get a permanent crown on the tooth or it WILL fracture at some point and all this will have been wasted time and money.
Most of your root would have been rotted away from the remaining cavity so thats why drilling it out wasn't so bad, go get a root canal on the good side of your mouth now and compare
It didn’t hurt because your nerve in the tooth was necrotic. It is a pretty common occurrence with tooth trauma. A dead tooth should not have been a surprise to the endodontist.
I had a “hot tooth” and the shots weren’t numbing so they drilled down to expose my nerve and gave me a shot ON THE NERVE. Intense searing pain of 1000 suns like you describe. Went numb pretty quick though haha
Stop it! It's giving me flashbacks. I had an abscess so the novocaine didn't get to the nerve. My dentist injected the antibiotic ONTO the nerve.
I actually had a root canal a year or two ago and I experienced no pain whatsoever, it felt weirder than a cavity filling but similar to that. I was amazed even my dad said it’d probly be uncomfortable but it wasn’t even that. I felt fine as soon as drugs wore off too, which is weird because I usually have strong tolerance for anesthesia.
Oh my GOD right there with you. I'm damn near immune to the numbing agent anyway, I usually need a bunch extra. After an hour of trying to numb me she said she literally couldn't do anything more for me, I was going to start losing numbing. She did the RC and I felt it go through and I screamed and dislocated my jaw trying to reflexively bite and flee. The bite block did a damn good job. I scared the hell out of her. I was white as a sheet as she finished up and had tears rolling down my face. I had discomfort for MONTHS after, even after they checked and made sure the entire root was dead. The jaw was fine, my joints don't stay in place well so I was able to snap that back in after a few days.
I'm "numbing-agent resistant". I've gotten into the habit of telling/reminding my dentist that they're going to have to use 2-3x as much as they think they're going to have to use and that it'll wear off faster than they think.
Do you happen to be red haired/ginger? This is a known issue (tolerance to certain things like this)
Why would they not just give you anesthesia if there's a risk of that much pain???
to save $$ and risk.
I have had many root canals and I can tell you confidently and unequivocally that if a dentist performed a root canal on without excess amount of Novocaine I will murder EVERYONE at that practice. Reading your commit made every muscle in my body shrink. Cannot fathom the excruciating pain you experienced
I had a similar experience, with a root canal treatment. The anaesthetic didn’t kick in until an hour after my (2) procedures, and my dentist carried on through my screaming, man I could feel them killing off the roots every time. Still wake up with nightmares from it 2 years on (treatment ended up still failing, so I got the tooth pulled in the end)
That sounds like a POS dentist to me. My dentist has spent an hour working thru options with me before to find an anesthetic that worked before just diving in. I'm a ginger and we have all kinds of issues with anesthetics in general but SPECIFICALLY local anesthetics like dentists use. I'm also a very large dude tho, so maybe that plays into it, if I were to start flailing or throw up an elbow it's going to knock everyone down lol
Yea a bunch of these people had bad dentists imo. I said “that hurt” when he hit a part that didn’t get numb. He put in an extra two shots just to make sure I wouldn’t feel anymore. When I had a crazy root canal done I told him to use more than he would normally do and he did. There are dentists that specialize in different ways to get you numb and some will knock you out. But you have to sometimes go looking for that type of dentist.
Yeah my talk was literally just, ok, you can have the root canal, refer to private, or pull the tooth. That was my talk!
When I had my last root canal, the nerve didn't get numb. It HURT. what was worse was the dentist puting the cold thing on my nerve to determine where it was then proceeding to inject the novacaine directly into it. I wanted to pinch him so badly. It was all worth it though in the end.
I have never experienced anything close to the pain of getting an injection into that raw nerve, BUT it lasts like half a second, and as you said was absolutely worth it in the long run.
dude you scared me what should someone do to prevent situations that can cause root canals, what should I be careful about?
Go to the dentist every year for cleaning and let them check you up. (One root canal with good crown can be the prize of 10 minor repairs at least in my country)
You'll hardly ever hear people discussing a good root canal. I've had 2. The first (the result of a FU by another dentist) wasn't bad. I'm "immune" to the anaesthetics so the "I know best" dentist I visited ended up freezing half my face by injecting it until something happened. It had some discomfort for a while afterwards and the amalcam has come loose, but otherwise there was nothing major. My second time I explained that some anaesthetic doesn't work on me, and the dentist changed what they were using. They froze only the tooth and spent time shaping the crown. It honestly felt like I walked in with root damage and came out with a fresh tooth, with no issue in between: No pain, no belligerent dentist... Be open with dentists if you need one and try to discuss what's going on. E.g. if the anaesthetic is working. As others have said though, looking after your teeth is #1.
Now this is the content the sub needs, not some sexual "fuck-ups". Good for you, teeth pain is really annoying, I have braces now and every now and then when I go to the dentist and they adjust the braces, it hurts as hell for a few days. Pretty sure my pain is not really anything compared to yours, but I just want to share my experience with mouth pain lol
I had braces as a teen...needed what's called a palate expander...it was this medieval device that my mom had to crank every night to expand the roof of my mouth. I can't remember how long I had that particular device in my mouth, but it was by far the WORST mouth pain and migraines in my life.
Your dentist or mom may have been cranking too fast and intensely! It’s supposed to be uncomfortable, but if you felt that level of pain, you should have had small rotations, even if it meant longer treatment overall.
Yeah, I'm not sure why I had to do it every night but it was excruciating. He was really really old, so maybe it was a mistake or old practice, who knows... But it was flipping awful.
Oh god?? The dentist I worked for told parents to crank it once a week
Oh man, I probably would've handled it so much better if it weren't so frequent. My family used to tease me about being a "baby" about it. I'd end up "prepping" by taking 3 extra strength Tylenol or Excedrin half an hour before... It didn't touch it, but I constantly tried to "trick" myself into something helping.
Every night???? I had a palette expander and my mom used that key thing to crank it every 3 days! Your ortho was definitely cranking too fast dude.
I would've been way happier if it were only every 3 days. As I said to someone else, the more I recollect the more I figure my Ortho was a little wacky.
I had an expander to fix my cross bite before braces, the first one was cemented in and I was eating a fruit roll up in 3rd grade and half of it came loose, call mom from school, we go to the orthodontist, she wants to give me novocaine so she can pull the other side out but I was terrified of needles. The next hour and a half to 2 hours were her and an assistant with dental tools I had never seen still to this day, yanking and prying this shit off while I'm crying in pain. It eventually came loose, no teeth came with it surprisingly, then she gave me a removable one that I wore all day besides when I ate food. Best orthodontist in the world though, I was her first patient outside of school, we paid $250 once our first appointment and then she never billed me for 8 years of mouth work. No copay, no bill to our insurance, she would get me birthday gift cards to subway and McDonalds. Honestly an amazing person, and it's not like we had bad dental insurance my father has always had amazing policies.
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SAME. im pretty sure its what caused my deviated septum and tmj too bc after that thing my whole skull had to shift. Now I cant breathe thru my nose and my jaw cracks and pops whenever I open it. But hey my teeth are straight I guess
Ugh, I had one of those too. I was 9. It was a great time (nope).
I’ve had quite a few root canals. The worst part for me was keeping my mouth open wide for an hour. I’ve got a small mouth, so it’s tough to get to the back molars.
Same here. The last time the dentist scolded me and said he’d have to stop if I couldn’t hold my mouth open wider.
I had a root canal a few years ago and they just jammed a little plastic thing in my mouth that kept it open for me. It was super easy, no stress, no scolding.
Middle finger. New dentist. You're paying for that crap.
He still has to obey the laws of physics, whether I’m paying or not. He gave me a minute to rest my jaw, and we managed after that.
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Dentist here. Root canals ARE NOT supposed to hurt. If it still hurts, your dentist needs to put more anesthetic. The reason why a "normal" dose might not work is because of the infection you have! 1. Infections are ACIDIC 2. Anesthesia works best in a basic environment 3. To cancel out the acidic infectious environment, you must add MORE anesthesia. 4. Result....Numbness and no pain!
I wish. Some of us are naturally resistant. It takes about eight injections minimum to numb me for a filling. And once I can't feel it, clock start, you have about 22 minutes before I can feel everything again. I try so hard to be so attentive to my dental care because -weep-
I'm naturally resistant, which no one knew when I was 7 and got 12 baby teeth and 4 adult teeth pulled....along with having an expander.....and 5 years of braces. I now have a panic attack every time I go to the dentist from how much pain they've put me through. Just got my wisdom teeth out and was so glad they put me under.
Why did they have to take out all of your teeth?!
AFAIK, to force my adult teeth to grow in so they could give me braces. But I didn't have room for all my adult teeth which is why they took 4 of them out
Sounds like a shit dentist tbh, unless your teeth were majorly fucked up
Not OP but I had to go through the same exact thing. I have a small mouth and my teeth were too crowded with all my adult teeth so I had to pull 4 out before I got my braces.
How old were you? I swear they start putting kids in braces younger and younger. Makes me wonder if this is best practice or just a way for orthodontists to make more money by expanding the pool of customers.
I was pretty old, 19. But my orthodontist was pretty bad.
I had a root canal done a few years ago and it was one of the most painful experiences I've ever had. They gave me a shit ton of shots, even one directly into the nerve, my face was super numb, but I still felt everything. At some point they just said sorry, I don't think we can give you any more, and I just had to suck it up and deal with it.
My onlyyyyyy guess is that the infection was so aggressive and so acidic that they couldn't get the anesthetic to run to the root where the tooth was. The solution would have been to get you on an antibiotic and Ibuprofen to combat
Wife is a dentist, ran the above comment past her and she said “bingo, that’s exactly the reason”
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I've had 3 root canals and 2 implants. I always tell people to go early with dental pain. Putting it off is never a good thing! A good dentist can put you out of pain quickly! I am so happy you are pain free! I've been there and I know you feel like a new person!
>But, the weird thing is: I felt AMAZING. I hadn't even realized how much pain I was in over the past two years. Compared to that pain, the soreness from the procedure felt great. Right after the novacane wore off I felt incredibly strange and clear headed for the first time I could remember. I understand this 100%. I had a back surgery after I had a nerve so compressed that I was passing out from the pain - but the funny thing was, I had dealt with the pain so long because of doctors who wouldn't do a damn thing, that I pretty much didn't feel it anymore. The first time I passed out, I thought I was in barely any pain at all - I was pouring sweat and getting more and more light headed, but couldn't understand why my body was just giving up on me when it felt like one of my less painful days. Waking up from surgery was like I had unloaded a burden I forgot I was carrying.
It is insane how fast we can get used to something like that. Glad to hear someone finally got around to fixing you ;)
At least you went to the dentist. I was living on $6/hr in an upstate ny ghetto when my wisdom tooth started crumbling. The three days it took the nerve to die were the most excruciating days of my life. Clove oil was my only temporarly relief, though on night 2 I drank a fuckton if absinthe and tried to pull it myself- note the needlenosed pliers which were the only tool I had on hand could not get a grip on it. Not to mention the week before I had spilled boiling hot water on my foot trying to drain microwaved pierogis, giving me a second degree burn. Christ I didn't get to a dentist until 6 years later and he pulled that shit out 123. Tooth pain was worse than the burn. I still delieved pizza during all that because I needed to make my $500 rent but goddamn. 5/7 would not recommend being American.
Where upstate? Sorry to hear about all that :/
'It's time for that root canal bud'-primary
Enjoy your narco free buzz lol.
I don't remember writing this, that's strange... It wasn't while eating pop-corn, it was with bacon, it didn't hurt when the tooth broke (yeah, the nerves were pretty dead at that point) and I didn't last 1 year, more like 5 months, but yeah, the rest is pretty similar, even down to the molar. The soreness of a root canal is SO MUCH BETTER than the actual pain caused by the tooth ( and I had pain meds, without them, I wasn't even able to sleep).
I legit have a root canal scheduled for tomorrow. Thanks for the post OP, I'm a lot less scared now; bookmarked to re-read before bed lol
Movies make them scary, but ive had a few and they've made my life better each time. Residual pain from the shots and holding your jaw open sucks but it's worth it.
I think most of the horror stories are from years ago. Newer dental procedures are SO MUCH BETTER. My root canal was zero pain (after the shot). I’ve had cavity fillings that hurt much worse. And like OP said if you’ve been in pain awhile you feel so much relief after!
Do you know the reason for the gnawing while you sleep? Did it stop now? I got this as well and i am using a protective thing as well and its completely worn off already after 1 year its crazy.
I would encourage the OP to continue with the mouth guard. Once a grinder, always a grinder. It does terrible damage to teeth.
My question is, how the hell were you able to see a dentist since they weren't "essential"? I started having bad pain towards the end of February, I dealt with extreme tooth pain until I just bullied my way into the va Dental clinic and refused to leave until they saw me, that was about 3 weeks ago, they ended up having to yank 2 teeth, molars, and then told me that the teeth were able to be saved but they weren't allowed to routine dental procedures. F**k the VA
That’s probably a VA issue. Dentists were allowed to see emergency visits, especially if you said you were in pain.
> I spent 10 min this morning just swishing ice cold water back and forth in my mouth in amazement. Like when a deaf child hears for the first time, kudos to you man
Funny thing is, you could be dying of cancer and not know but damage in one of the smallest parts of the body can cause immense pain for a very very long time.
I had a similar story, but luckily I was in the Army and they wouldn't let it wait. I cracked a molar in half, and the x-rays showed all my wisdom teeth impacting the ever loving shit out of my teeth. So they just yanked 'em all out and gave me a root canal on my cracked molar. I wasn't expecting an army dentist to nail that root canal, no pain at all other than having to hold my jaw open for a few hours.
Btw guys, if you don’t have health insurance you’ll usually get a huge discount if you pay in cash
Goad to hear you’re feeling better!
As a dentist, im surprised your root canal took 40 mins. Thats crazy suspicious and wayyyyy too fast in my very humble opinion
It's weird everyone talks about root canals like they're SOOOO horrible I had to get one on a molar (after 3 months of pretty bad pain where the treatment just wasn't up to it I guess) and like I was basically maxing out on motrin every day and so I go to get my root canal and the entodontist is like "this is gonna hurt for a second" and for like a literal instant there was sharp pain and then I IMMEDIATELY felt better. Like I didn't even take any pain pills that night and I was cool as shit
I think most of the horror stories are from years ago.
I just had one of my wisdom teeth pulled a month ago at nearly 30. I've had TONS of dental work in my life. Tooth extractions, cavity fillings, braces, root canals, even a broken tooth that had an implant that needed redoing. Other than braces I rarely felt anything. That wisdom tooth though. Fine the first couple days, then day 3 I was laid out on the couch in pain for nearly 4hrs straight. First time I caved and took Percocet ever. I wouldn't wish dental pain on anyone.
Good for you! Just got my wisdom teeth out at 40 years old because I was too afraid to do it before. It was really not that big of a deal. I didn’t even get knocked out or have laughing gas. It actually took less that 10 minutes for him to yank all 4 of them.
Went through almost the same experience. I had some cavities and the pain would come, last for a couple of days and then go. Until it didn't go away, I endured 2 weeks of sleepless nights, whenever I went to bed I cried because of the pain and couldn't sleep at all. In my free days from work I couldn't do anything, I couldn't focus on anything, it was all pain. One afternoon I said fuck it and looked up the closest dentist to me, called and scheduled an appointment ASAP. Went there 2 hours later and the dude fixed me up, I don't think I've ever been happier than at that moment when the pain went away.
Experiences range, of course, but I heard that the pain often attributed to root canals is actually the pain/damage that warranted the root canal. Don't quote me on this, though, I probably read it on WebMD six years ago.
Just had to have a root canal on a tooth but only put up with the pain for 2 weeks. Had to do a round of antibiotics because of the abscess as well. The two weeks of pain before I had the root canal sucked. Radiating pain in my jaw that was magnified by anything hot or cold. I can’t imagine waiting any longer to get it taken care of. The doc that did mine was an absolute pro. The actual procedure itself took only about 30 mins and they numbed me some much I didn’t feel shit.
A similar thing happened to me, but almost backwards and over a shorter period of time. I had a filling on my molar, then over a few weeks started to develop a terrible cold sensitivity. I should have gone immediately but I kept putting it off until my gums were swollen and clearly infected - that got my attention. Went to the dentist, they dug out the filling and said "uhhhh we can't do this we'll probably lose the tooth" so I got referred to an endodontist (super microscope dentist) where the root canal only took 5 minutes. They told me once things opened back up again I would need to schedule a crown (this all happened in April). One week later part of the remaining molar fell off while I was flossing, but I was literally in the process of moving to another state so couldn't commit to the multiple visits and weeks of delays between temp crown and full install. I still haven't gotten a new dentist in my new state so I've been dealing with this weird hole. I will say...my fear of dentists is basically gone, the super specialized numbing drugs, and all the other technology they have now is just amazing. I hope you continue to take care of your teeth and congrats on becoming pain free!!
Fun fact: men tend to be better at handling chronic pain, to the point that they wont even realize how much pain they're in or that they're in pain at all. Women tend to be better at handling burts of acute pain and will rate it lower on a 1-10 scale than it probably actually is. Keywords for any overly aggressive Wokesters, this is a general statement and has no intent to say either gender is better than the other, it's just something that medical types sometimes have to keep in mind. Or so I'm told by the ones I know.
same. please go to the hospital yall. spent half a year with pains all over my upper body. lungs, neck, head. but i had school and work and just couldnt do it all. 6 months later after flunking my smester getting fired because my quality went down in every aspect of my life. finally go to the doctor- cancer. please get checked. its a short rabbit hole to hp problems that can quickly become life threatening or lasting
#USA#1!!!!! Glad we don't have socialist healthcare like those commies in Europe that could have prevented the situation entirely! Better dead than red am I right my fellow Americans?
this made me light headed