Saturday, July 20, 2013

Rolling Stone Wisdom

This week I finally got round to having my wisdom tooth removed. It looks like 2013 is the year for Alesha Dixon to finally be unchallenged in pole position on my list of things that make me want to break people.

The only body part I've ever had remotely linked to some level of intelligence and I'm having it removed. C'est la vie.

Call me a knob head, you won't be the first person (NHS reception staff are less than courteous in the mornings) but I'd opted for local anaesthetic as it's significantly cheaper for the NHS and I'm saving my coupons for the day I might have to have a child removed from somewhere I'm far more protective over than my mouth. If they ever make it possible to spit a child out then I'll transfer my coupons to getting snakes for hair which is the only form of cosmetic surgery I've ever considered.

So I was pretty nervous. Nervous is not the word, I was utterly terrifed. This is an important thing for you to know before I tell this story. I was petrified. By way of an explanation of how terrified I get in medical situations, a few weeks ago my sister fell down a cliff and when I took her to hospital for a check up, I nearly passed out when they took the brace off. She was fine.

So, I get into the chair and they inject me with the anaesthetic and I've been crying since I spelled my surname for the receptionist (That's K-N-O-B...) and the nurse puts on a worried face and asks me if I'm OK. Apparently I'm not reacting well to the anasethetic.

It's at this point that I realise I have neglected to tell them I suffer from panic attacks. They, in turn, have neglected to tell me there is adrenaline in the anaesthetic. It's a perfect storm of over stimulation. Like a firework display of sweat and prepubescant emotional outbursts. Imagine getting Tracey Beaker drunk and letting her fuck Justin Bieber. After a Red Bull. And some smack.

I am reacting badly to the anaesthetic... All of my limbs are trembling uncontrollably so the nurse just keeps saying, "Are you sure you had breakfast love? Did you have any breakfast? Can you tell me what you had for breakfast?" I'm trembling away, listening to the questions thinking, "When did I become Keith Richards?"

They had to get on and I was trying to calm down so I said to the Doctor, I'm just going to put my headphones in and close my eyes, please don't tell me about the procedure... just do it and pat me when I'm done. I don't want to know. I want this to be as much like my sex life as possible.

I want to know nothing. I want to be the Samantha Brick of tooth extractions. But my doctor just cannot help narrating.

"I'm just making a small incision..." LA LA LA
"I'm just wiggling it free..." LA LA LA
"I'm just..." WHAT? SPONSORED BY AUDIBLE?? SHUT THE FUCK UP.

I got through it. I know I'm pathetic and other people cope with much worse and my hat goes off to them. They are much braver than me. I got through it by panciking and sweating and crying.

Now, when I say I sweated, I mean I REALLY sweated. Like that obese, topless hairy man that resides in every town and comes out in August to frighten children and promote Veet for the next generations copulative optimists.

I had really sweated, and in a leather chair you really feel the sweat. But, the thing was, I'd been so genuinely terrifed... I was quite worried, that I had done slightly more than sweat. I was really quite wet.

And the nurse goes, "Shall we get your boyfriend back in?"

How am I supposed to check? I can't ask the nurses, what if I have and he comes back in to be greeted with, "She's had a bit of an accident?" This is no time for finding out if he loves me - I'm chewing on some gauze and have been told I cannot rinse my mouth for 24 hours. There's no way to distract him.

If I've pissed myself during a tooth extraction then what the hell's coming out during childbirth?

"So... how are you feeling? Shall we get your boyfriend back in?"

Not until I'm absolutely certain I have not wet myself.

(I am definitely Keith Richards).

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