Back To Hell [C,L]

THURSDAY, 8/23/07

I wake up in horrible pain. A toothache. It had been bothering me before so I made an appointment for Monday. It was a crowned/root canaled tooth. Or "dead". I thought maybe the gum was being bothered by the chemo. The pain on Thursday had me believing in Hell again. I called my dentist and they squeezed me in at 230PM. By the time I left I was screaming bloody murder and punching our bathroom/tiled wall. I was ready to cut into my Gum and relieve the pressure/pain.

An excruciating X-ray revealed a massive infection under the "dead" tooth and in one of the canals. The root canal was done the winter of '99-00. Nice job, fuck heads. The X-ray was excruciating because of all the crap they put in your mouth and bite on feels really horrible when you have mouth sores.

We go with a "retry". Redo the root canal instead of pulling/implant or doing a bridge. at 1300 it's also the cheapest method. they calculate insurance will pay about 550. Yay. Glad we're made of money and have no other expenses.

The doc gives me a few shots of novocaine and asks if I want Nitrous. I decline. they aren't trained anesthesiologists. That's why sometimes, on a rare occasion, someone dies at the dentist. And as I've "dabbled" in anesthesia......lets say I know how precarious the patients position is. So I decline but I'm nervous. I can still feel the tooth. My doc loads me up. I think I got 8-12 shots total and then they go to work. For a change, its pain free. The procedure might have been an hour. The relief I feel is indescribable I went from a "10" to a "0" on the pain scale. I almost hugged her. She gives me a script for amoxicillan and I'm out the door. The infection was so large that she left it open so it could drain. Yummy. I did smell it once the drill reached the little buggers. Yummy x 1000.

Wonder why the infection exploded then? Dani also wondered. This happened last time I went through chemo.....

I get the script and it calls for 4 pills right away then 1 every 6 hours. So at 6PM I chug 2000mg of Amoxicillan. Or does 2grams sound larger?

~8PM I'm feeling a toothache. She didn't give me any pain killers. I pop an Oxycodone (Percocet) left over from Surgery.

~15min later I feel a rush of warmth and start sweating.

Fuck.

I grab a thermometer. 101.2. Dani gets off the phone with her mom. I take my temp again. 101.4 FUCK!

during chemo a fever sends you to the doc or the ER if its after hours. I call the on-call anyway. She sends me to the ER. For some reason we drive. stupid. We're kind of in a state of panic. once there they take my vitals. I'm down to ~99.5. So we wait. I hate waiting. I'm so tired of waiting. I tell Dani I'm thirsty and feeling dizzy. She goes up and tells the registrar. I get the next room. It's pediatrics but I get the next room (shhhhhhh. don't ever do that at home, kids). And it's pretty. Unfortunately it's also a big diaper/formula supply room. Oh well. I was tired and wanted a bed.

I won't go through the details of a teaching ER again. Or the fact that its still summer so it's chock full of inexperienced fucks. Or that the student missed my vein twice. That would all be redundant.

The fever disappeared. Several things could have caused it, including taking a massive dose of antibiotics.

however, my WBC (White Blood Cell) and Absolute (Absolute Neutrophil Count) counts are 1.4 and 460, respectively. I'm in the basement. After only 1 cycle. I'm at a High Risk rate for infection. This is my week off from chemo. My weekend off from chemo. Now I have to avoid people.

Into the ER at 8:30PM. Out at 1:30AM.

And my week destroyed.


Peace.