I ran through the 10th floor of the Avalon clutching my face and a glass of red wine with equal desperation. I was stressed; I was hungry, and most of all I was in pain. Was this karma for the times I shuffled into the bus without paying the $1.25? Was I being punished for giving away my hamster the moment it transformed from a cute furball into a glaucoma-infected rodent? No, this wasn’t retribution; this was the pain of four impacted wisdom teeth.
The pain was throbbing and came in sharp waves that made my eyes twitch. It started in my right jaw Thursday morning as I awoke for my 8:55 am class. By 2 pm the pain was also deep into my gums. Within hours the pain also inflicted my left jaw and gums. It was impossible not to think about. My head hurt. Anytime I moved my head, the throbs were more painful.
My current dentist is back in New York. Oh, how I longed for her bubblegum flavored gloves to inject me with novocaine, or what she referred to as, “a mosquito bite.” I didn’t have time to go home. No medication was helping. The only thing that subsided the pain was to imagine taking a hammer to my jaw. I would fantasize about breaking my jaw out of my skull. ‘That would feel nice,’ I deliriously thought to myself.
It had been 12 painful hours and I expected it would only get worse. That’s when I made the decision no one should ever have to make. I sat at my computer at 9 pm that same day, and made an appointment at the Berks Dentist for 10:30 Friday morning. For those of you who don’t know what the Berks Dentist is—I’ll set the scene.
If you were to approach the Berkshire Apartment Complex, you would see one apartment with a broken blue green sign that spells, “Dentist.” It looks like more of a meth dispensary or fight club venue than a dentist, or as I called it, my last saving grace.
I tentatively walked in at 10:30 am to an apartment-turned-dentist office. There was an elderly man getting a teeth-cleaning making small talk to the one dentist. I sat in a chair, in what would be normally called, a “waiting room.”
Everyone always asks, “What was it like in there?” Sadly, I don’t remember much because the pain was so shocking I was 50 percent blacked out. I’ll tell you what I do remember.
The dentist called my name and it was my turn. I sat down in the dental chair and he diagnosed me with “four impacted wisdom teeth.” A nurse rushed in and told me I had two options, to get them out now or to get them taken out at a dental surgeons office. I made the decision to get them out at a dental surgeons office. She then called a surgeons office and held the phone to her chest as she said, “they can’t take you until Monday.” I began to cry, to which her response was, “She’s in a lot of pain,” and held the phone up to my wailing. I got an appointment for the next morning. The dentist came out and prescribed me something for the pain and wished me luck.
I no longer make fun of the Berks Dentist. Every time I pass that broken blue neon sign, I give a knowing smile and nod. That apartment-turned-dentist office saved my life (and mouth), and it could save yours too.