I am having gum surgery on Friday morning...

[Sannum]

And I am starting to get really, really nervous! The procedure is called a gum-lift, and it is for both cosmetic and practical reasons. I am sure the result will be wonderful, but I am so nervous about the post-op pain. It is the only thing I can think of right now.

Groan...I can't back out now! It is not open-heart surgery, but I have no reference point for it. I have never had surgery before!

[Rosemary2205]

1. It can't hurt any worse than having 5 teeth pulled.

Everyone's pain tolerance is different of course but I'm a total freakin pain wuss and I managed just fine with whatever narcotic they gave (I'm thinking it was that Tylenol w/codeine stuff)- and a warm mushy diet (oatmeal, soup, mashed taters, overcooked noodles and sauce etc.)

I gently swoooshed salt water around in there 3 times a day afterwards and that helped too. Ask them if that will help. Within 2 days I didn't even need a regular tylenol and just had to be a little careful what I ate for another week.

[AlCzervik]

2. i had that done, i had a major dental restoration about 6 years ago

and that part really wasn't bad, in fact all of the procedures hurt far less then the pain i had from my teeth before the restoration. Bring an ipod or whatever music device you have and you'll be fine, i had no post op pain, just a little discomfort.

[Connonym]

3. it'll be fine

I have had to have skin grafts on my gums a couple times -- evidently I brush too hard. The worst part of it, I felt was where they took the grafts off the roof of my mouth. I don't recall an awful lot of pain or even discomfort in the gums themselves. You may have some ache in your jaw from keeping your mouth open so long but really I don't think you should expect too much in the way of postoperative pain. Your endodontist will probably give you something like Vicodin for postop and you should be totally numb during the procedure so that won't hurt. You'll want to talk to the endodontist about any concerns you have but it should be pretty straight forward. You may even ask about using nitrous during the procedure if you're especially nervous and definitely, as mentioned above, using an ipod is a great idea.

You'll do fine. Normal to be a bit nervous but from my experience it was really not that much more uncomfortable than having a large filling placed. Good luck :hug:

[Sannum]

4. Thanks everyone.

I will be sure to charge my ipod the night before. I have had teeth pulled as a child because I could not lose baby teeth naturally. The pain was not extreme, but this procedure, though the results will be amazing, sounds very frightening!

I am allergic to the metal in needles, so that will probably be the main source of discomfort.