IN A STATE OF BEING DEPRIVED

                     
BEING TOOTHLESS IS NO JOKE
The other day, luckily, weather took a breezy turn. Early morning walk in the pleasantly windy and cool atmosphere was like a treat, after the prickly heat of many sweaty days. The branches of the trees were swinging to and fro in carefree abandon and there was a singing spree by birds and half a dozen squirrels were scampering around gaily, enamored by the soft cool wind.

Back home, I felt light hearted and at ease which propelled me to divulge something which I had gone through and am still mired neck deep into. But somehow I felt squeamish about sharing it with my blog friends.

Actually, you may not even be amused. However, I decided I won’t let this experience go waste. ‘What are friends for’? I thought. ‘They’ve to be informed’, discretion demanded. ‘And be prepared even to be ignored’, heart warned.

As an indiblogger, I’m acquainted with so many of you in the virtual world and feel the proximity between us a click or a comment away. Friendship in the real world pales into insignificance before the colorful and no holds barred camaraderie existing in the community of indibloggers and others in the blogosphere. Such a wonderful prerogative we enjoy to be able to open our hearts creatively before equally creative minds.
….
Here comes the narrative of my ordeal:

I grew up in the serious fifties and sixties, so humor and I are poles apart. I may succeed in drawing some laugh lines though, provided you read it. Bored- are you already?

It all started in December last. It appears as if, it was recorded in my janam patri slyly by Satan himself when God had gone for some rest. It was destined. Had been waiting in the wings for quite sometime, dropping painful hints now and then. For how long can one remain immune to the tell tale signs, though? The efforts to blot out their passage failed. They had to show up. And show up they did.

Tooth pain, friends, is said to be the mother of all pains. In fact my teeth had stopped fully cooperating long back and I had been through periodic sessions of drilling, filling, cleaning and an odd extraction here and there. Over time I had developed a sort of paranoia about dental work. It was not that I did not do the usual routine of brushing, flossing etc. All my care couldn’t compensate for nature’s injustice. I inherited a faulty jaw line and molars with a deeper indent in the middle, attracting caries like bees to flowers; my oral hygiene notwithstanding. (Lucky you with your pearly whites!)-:)

More than fair share of visits to the dentist had been my forte since my thirties and brooding ‘why me’ never helped. I took refuge in the saying ‘To err is human’ and missed dental appointments on one pretext or the other and this led to the saga of pain.

Presently pain came with heavy foot falls to challenge the presence of my wisdom teeth. The excruciating tooth ache opened the ‘Pandora’s box’ of troubles, resulting in a long drawn suffering stint. Home remedies were woefully ineffective. Pain killers provided temporary relief. I was even prepared to go to the gallows to escape paying obeisance to the dentist’s chair .But things were pitted against me. No way could I delay further. Ultimately the conspiracy of continuous moaning dragged me to the altar of the dreaded chair. The wise molar got extracted with hard pulling and shaking, so strong were its roots. Left me limp and traumatized.

In the aftermath, antibiotics and pain killers became my bosom friends. Another blow came when the unceasing throbs took me to the dentist again. He examined the gaping hole and declared that I had a dry socket (lack of blood supply to the injured gum tissue.) I visited him for three consecutive days for dressing the exposed bone, as the gum tissue around it had got bruised in the difficult extraction procedure. It took two months to heal and left me so scared that I kept the next on hold as long as I could. My expectations for early recovery had by now plummeted and the second one I took in my stride.
In the midst of this misadventure, I was easily taken in by the dentist’s advice that I better have the rest pulled out and have a complete denture which will be the permanent end of my woes. I was cautioned by well wishers, that there’s no substitute for the natural ones but I remained adamant partly because of the disgust and partly because I was wearing a partial denture already.

Finally, I went through the inevitable. Pl. don’t enquire about my troubles for the last five months as you’ve viewed the trailer above and you can visualize the rest. Now at least the World Wide Web can either sympathize with me or dump me, for sure.

To save my sanity in this deprived state, I take recourse to writing and posting on my blog now and then.

The result: In the place where once my jaws were holding some good and some crooked teeth, there is a dark cave inside, the cheeks are sunken and the mirror image throws a prominent nosed ghost.

The tongue feels lonely as if it has lost its way and wonders where her friends have disappered while it was sedated. Poor thing has to do a lot of chewing with the help of the palate to feed me.

Hunger is a great teacher. So many innovations have been adopted to enable me to survive. My food gets blended in the mixer, though I hate the concoction. I manage to eat fruit and cooked veggies and have lost a few kilos from my already lean frame.

However, this tale of mine isn’t ending any time soon. My gums still look meaty in spite of gum astringent massage and need more shrinking. I’m waiting for the final trial to begin, so that it may end.

The moral:

# 1: Short cuts don’t work in life. One repents later.

# 2: Take decisions wisely, as these will impact your whole life.

# 3: Take care of your set of teeth as you’d, your gold, diamonds and pearls and these will stand by you for a lifetime.

Friends what do you think of the whole episode.
Image courtesy : The internet