After the extraction of my wisdom tooth, I’m doing good and feeling well but yesterday my harmless playful act of throwing some drops of water on face of my younger sister was enough for her to conclude that during the process of tooth extraction, I’ve also lost my wisdom.
It so happened that in this past week, I was feeling that the tooth at the end of my upper right jaw had gone sharp at its edges and while chewing food, its sharpness was creating pain in my mouth.
On examning, my dentist told me that due to decay the tooth was in really bad shape and removing it would be the best option.
Sitting there on a doctor’s chair, I was in shock. The mere word of ‘extraction’ created a picture of injection in my mind.
My prior experience of watching tooth extraction of my mother was making me nervous but my dentist was kind enough to remind me that I would feel no pain during the process and after preparing myself for a day, I went for the treatment in the evening.
On our way to a doctor, my parents kept on sharing their own experiences with me. My father never forget to remind me that dentist before using injection, applied some kind of spray in his mouth which didn’t allow him to feel any kind of injection pain.
Dentist never used any spray for me and what I experienced during the process of having two shots in my mouth was a pinching sensation and afterwards complete numbness.
When I received my first shot, my mother who herself was looking afraid asked me if I was doing well and in response I gave her a smile but after receiving second shot of dental anesthetic, I kept on shivering with shock for ten to minutes in waiting room.
Now that the area around my ‘tooth to be extracted’ was completely numb, I didn’t experience any pain but lots of pressure on my jaw, I could hear the sound of different tools working to lose my tooth in its socket.
The view of two dental assistants looking alert while surrounding me made me uneasy for a while. The whole process took some minutes but as I experienced lots of pressure, I thought it was way too long.
All’s well that ends well.
Prior to my visit to a dentist, I’ve this view about dentists that I considered them heartless in their act of using sharp needles in patients mouth but my views were largely based upon second hand experiences and on getting first hand experience, I would say that dentists are not that much scary.
Going back to the incident which I mentioned in the start, my sister was angry because she didn’t like the way I threw water on her and in her anger thought I’ve also lost my wisdom with my wisdom tooth.
I didn’t mind her conclusion because I’ve understand the meaning of the term which I read in my literature class.
‘Rite of passage’ marks an important event which can change the direction of entire course of life. After getting free of my wisdom tooth, I’m once again enjoying eating my food. Brushing teeth is no more an issue.
My sister is angry but I’m happy because wisdom tooth extraction has proved ‘rite of passage’ for me.
