::Surgery

I was told years ago that I should get my wisdom teeth out. Last Wednesday, one of them decided to push the issue by crumbling in my head whilst I was innocently chewing gum.

So, Friday morning I got to undergo my first surgery. I was full of fear, going in: that I was going to die from a reaction to the anesthesia; that they were going to break my jaw and wire it shut; etc.

Compared to that, this was certainly no big deal. I sat down in a chair, made some wisecracks, got an IV misplaced outside of a vein, sucked a bunch of nitrous oxide (another first, and an experience worth a description all its own), got the IV properly placed, and promptly fell the fuck asleep.

I’m told that I was a laugh riot on the way out of the surgeon’s office. That I high-fived the nice lady pushing the wheelchair, and that I did nothing but talk to K about how much I loved her. Apparently I cried tears of gratitude on the car ride home. I remember none of this. At all.

I’ve been tottering around the house drugged-up ever since, feeling like an invalid. I’m not SICK, so mentally I want to get up and go places and do things. See a movie. Get some sunshine. Fuck my woman. But my head is full of paaaain. And every time I try to skip a pill, it gets to be more than I can handle. So, I eat my Vicodin (yet another first) and sit on the couch and watch movies. Lord of the Rings extended edition, all in one weekend, yessir.

The incisions themselves don’t hurt (anymore). But I’m terribly swollen up from my molars down into my neck, and that’s where the pain is coming from at the moment. It hurts to talk and to chew. A lot. I’m having trouble managing more than a small bowl of mashed potatoes or some soup at one sitting. Which is probably contributing to my sitting around, wobbly and weak.

On the up side, with all the drugs, I didn’t even notice the usual vicious headache I get from caffeine withdrawal. Ha!

I hope this subsides soon. I am supposed to go back to work on Monday and run a meeting… and if I’m still too swollen to speak or eat solid food, I dunno about all that noise. And I’m tired of being all fuzzy-headed on Vicodin and falling asleep in the middle of things like an old man.

And I want a fucking cheeseburger. Preferably, eaten off a naked woman.