Don’t let anyone tell you a root canal doesn’t hurt. My first mistake was believing him when he said the digging out part had been done so there was no need for anaesthetic. Ten minutes later I’m experiencing mild pain, thinking I can handle this, twenty minutes later it’s going ok and I feel quite proud of myself. 5 minutes later and my hands have involuntarily flown to my face, my throat is burning, one of my nasal passages feels like its on fire, I can’t breathe and I’m choking on an acidic liquid which is sliding down my throat.
The dentist flushes out my throat and tells me it’s a dental bleach which cleans out the root of the tooth. He then says he’ll use the mouthwash instead, the moment its applied an intense pain starts and then starts to intensify to the point where a tear has rolled out of the corner of each eye. Again he flushes the tooth after 30 second of me thrashing about obviously in pain. After he’s flushed the wash away I say – that was very painful (an understatement, i actually meant to say; what the fuck was that? you motherfucker.), and he says that wasn’t painful, it was uncomfortable. I reply – nooo, that was definitely painful and he says, nooo, uncomfortable, and I say, uncomfortable for you, bloody painful for me.
Fortunately it got a lot less painful after that and finished without too much incident. It’s still throbbing a bit but I am being a brave wee soldier – helped somewhat by my self medicating with nurofen and white wine.





