The root of the matter

Yeah, well, my gum was infected. What with the recent health sagas of late, you'd never have predicted that, eh?

I put up with the pain for a week and secured an appointment at the dentist's on Tuesday. My boss was sweet – she let me leave work nice and early, so much so that I had time to collect my car so that I could get there with ease. She was probably also worried that I looked dreadfully pained and was somewhat odd as far as the new members of staff were concerned. I can't say I was at my most conversational but they seemed to understand.

So, dentist prods around, uses a jet cleaner thing to deep clean the wound and says he can a) see the tail-end of an infection (I was right! I knew that pain was abnormal!) and b) that he could 'see the bone'. *faint* Did he have to tell me that? I mean.

He stuffed some soluble dressing in the hole and prescribed antibiotics. Now, you'd think that would be that. It would be for others. But no. No, no. The antibiotics made me feel faint, nauseas, deeply tired and my stomach was puffed up like a balloon. I lost my appetite, which was a relief, as trying to eat while in pain had been terribly difficult. I couldn't exercise at all this week. I had no energy.

Anyway, I took the stuff for the rest of the week and was glad to take the last of the bitter pills today. The pain went after a couple of days, thank goodness, so it was worth the side-effects. I can just about brush the areas either side of the gum to clean a bit more thoroughly now, too. I like a fresh mouth.

The huge difficulty, however, is that this tooth saga has been stress-induced. I am beginning to realise that, actually, I do have a lot on my plate. It was when S sadly shook his head and said how awful it was that I had had to have a molar removed due to stress-related teeth-grinding that it hit home pretty hard. I don't mean that in a self-indulgent way, but seriously, I need to sort out the tangled source of my stresses – and the way I handle the (very) tough stuff. It's critical.