dental blues

i bit the proverbial bullet last week to have the last of my teeth removed and replaced with full dentures. i have officially graduated to toothless hag. by a masked stranger, no less. i still havenae a clue what the dentist and a few of the clinicians look like, but handling that in a medical establishment is several steps more natural to my phobic senses than handling it in a retail line. "he was wearing a mask" isn't as descriptive as it was on new year's day, 2020.

the masked man put the top denture in immediately after he extracted the last 7 teeth this past thursday. this morning marks the second time i have taken it out since the extraction. the dentist took it out friday morning to check the progress of the extraction wounds but he put it back in immediately after washing it and allowing me to rinse my mouth. this morning i will put it back in after i finish this journal entry.

i have known mouth pain for my entire life, so that part is unpleasantly familiar. the greater suprise is feeling like my mouth is now foreign country. i have to relearn how to eat, swallow and talk. the good news is that i have my speech therapy exercises to help with the talking part. to a lesser degree, my eating disorder therapy tools are helping with the eating and swallowing pieces.

onward through the fog. . .

hope healing happens here.