Estimated reading time: 4 minute(s)

Well, you may have noticed that yesterday’s story had a sort of abrupt conclusion. That’s because I wrote the last two or three paragraphs while running back and forth to the bathroom.

You see, when you have a tooth pulled, there is some amount of bleeding that occurs.

(WARNING: if you don’t like stories about blood, go on with your day now. If you’re OK with a little bit of such detail, you may continue.)

Well, I had been changing the gauze just fine from my roughly 2:30 tooth removal until about 4:30. That’s when I started noticing a different taste in my mouth. So, now instead of every half hour, I was changing the gauze every 7 minutes or so. And it just wouldn’t stop.

So, I laid down on the bed to see if relaxing would help. Nope. Actually, it seemed that the blood flow was increasing. That was slightly unsettling, so I called the doctor’s office. THEY HAD GONE HOME! Argh. Next I called the doctor’s home number which he had put on the brochure he gave me.

“Hello?” came the voice of a child.

“Hi, my name’s Greg Campbell.” Have you ever tried to speak with a piece of gauze in your mouth while blood is dripping out of your tooth cavity? I attempted to continue, “I had a tooth pulled today by [This Doctor]. Is this his home?”

“Yes, but he’s not here. Can I take your number?”

“Sure. That would be great.”

We exchanged information, and she assured me he would return home shortly. In the meantime, I went back to the bed to lie down.

About an hour later, no call from the doctor, but two more calls by me to some other folks I was nearing the end of my bag of gauze and there did not seem to be any end in sight to the bleeding. So, I was about to just go to a hospital, as I was beginning to feel a bit shaky or something.

Finally, the phone rings – it’s the doctor. He goes through some stuff with me, himself clearly agitated. I am trying to calmly explain what’s been going on, but he keeps interrupting me telling me to calm down. That confused me a bit. I found out later that he had a high school function for his middle son to attend that evening. So, his mind was sort of elsewhere.

After a bit of discussion, he says, “Well, why don’t you meet me in the office. How long does it take you to get there?”

“Twenty minutes.”

“OK, I’ll see you there then.”

And with that, I gathered up my last gauze and headed out the door.

Now, I’m not one to panic, nor am I one to bother other people with something I could probably do on my own. But, this thing was not stopping. In fact (this is the grossest it gets…), as I was driving, the blood was coming out so fast it started to come out of my mouth. It was like the movies! So I had to change the gauze while driving.

I put a couple more pieces in and asked God to make that last as long as possible. It did alright. The good doctor arrived shortly after I did, and we went right into his office.

He had me spit out the gauze and cleaned it out a bit in there, then he muttered something about why it hadn’t stopped, and told me, “I’m gonna get you sutured up. That should definitely stop it.”

I thought, “Whatever you say, Doc. Just stop this crazy bleeding.”

So, he numbed me up with more novocaine (twice in one day!) and then started sewing. 🙂 After not too long, he had tightened the place up and stuck more gauze up in there, and sent me on my way with another pack, saying I should be just fine now.

Well, he was mostly right. The bleeding had DEFINITELY slowed. That was nice. But it would not stop! Finally, I tried the tea bag trick. If you suck on a warm tea bag, it releases tannic acid while applying pressure, which is supposed to aid in the clotting. I think perhaps it did, because it seemed to be a lot less after that, and I even got to sleep with no gauze in the mouth. (I was hoping that would be the case.)

So, this morning arrived and I was not bleeding anymore, and I was happy to finally be past that part.

Now to get used to a mouth with one less tooth…