I learned something new today.... - Page 3

[shishkeberry]

I still have all of mine, but I really should have at least two of them removed. I'm getting repeat infections and I bite my own cheek all the time.

[Jaesun's Dad]

When my wisdom teeth were pulled they were horizontal. The docs showed me an xray and said "see this line?" ... "yeah" ... "that's a nerve" .. "ok" ... "see this?" ... "yeah" ... "that's your tooth" ... "ok" ... "what we're going to TRY to do is get your teeth out of there without hitting that nerve" ... "good luck" ... "exactly, the chances of this actually happening as planned are about 0% ... likely you're going to have some minor discomfort" ... "for how long?" ... "forever" ... "$%^#" ... "but if we don't do this your teeth will grow into that nerve anyway, and that will really suck" .. "*$(@" ...

They were right. Permanent discomfort. Aggravated by a few things, ironically, newcastle brown ale being about the worst (and I drink quite a few other beers none of them do this but newcastle always wakes up that nerve) 20 years later I still can't ignore that pain. I've lived with it half my life now, but it isn't very fun.

It didn't really seem very "elective" to me at the time. My mouth had been totally re-arranged by that point with braces, which may have contributed to the way my wisdom teeth came in, but by the time I had them pulled I think they really did need to get yanked.

[WTHamI?]

I think the routineness of it depends a lot on your dentist. I do know a lot of people who had them removed without reason from age 16-18, but kept mine until they started causing trouble when I was 23 (all four impacted and never came through the gum, two causing repeat infections and the other two pushing adjacent teeth out of alignment). Granted my dentist had suggested I have them removed around 16 when it was evident they were eventually going to be an issue, but since they weren't causing trouble at the time we ignored it and moved on. If they had come in normally I would still have them, although part of the reason a lot of people have them removed is that they truly don't have room for them and it's evident from an x-ray that they are going to be problematic. My brother's came in normally and he still has them at 25, same dentist that recommended extraction for me in high school did not recommend extracting his, so at least some dentists do evaluate it on a case by case basis.

I do think wisdom teeth have a rather high rate of being truly problematic, versus something like circumcision where having an intact penis is very rarely a problem.

[Cinder]

Originally Posted by Minky

I had one removed, which had a cavity in it, when I was 25. It was such a terrible procedure that I opted to have another one drilled, rather than pulled, when I had another cavity at 30.

My husband had the "pre-emptive" removal, which was proposed to both of us by our dentists when we were in our teens, and had a much more complicated recovery as they had to cut into his gum to find the not-yet-erupted teeth. I thought what I went through was bad, but when he told me about his ordeal, I was shocked. And there was nothing wrong with his teeth!

I remember my dentist saying, "We'll let you keep your wisdom teeth if you keep them clean," like it was their choice, when I was a teenager. I walked right out of that office and never went back.

I see a lot of parallels with circ and always have.

This is what my dh had done except due to pain, and the reason they weren't in yet was impaction, not age...without anesthesia due to some weird metabolic issues (he also had a vasectomy last week under the same conditions ). His recovery was non-existant...he took 1 pain pill (motrin, nothing rx) and was eating steak that night... so not a big deal at all. So I think if vastly differs from person to person, but I personally haven't met anyone who had a hard time with recovery.

It doesn't make me brave enough to let them take out mine though, even though they do cause issues.

[knitted_in_the_wom]

Originally Posted by Claire and Boys

.. that Americans routinely remove healthy wisdom teeth from people.

Asking on Twitter about this after seeing a tweet about it, and several people tweeted back that yes, it is a routine thing that is done to most teens, without any evidence of a problem, as prophylaxis.
...

I live in the UK, and wisdom teeth only tend to be removed here if there is a problem with them. ....

Anyway, slightly digressing from the forum topic, but thought it was an interesting comparison.

I agree--interesting comparison!

I know that to join the Peace Corps you are *required* to get your wisdom teeth removed (at least that was the case when I was in college) because "something might go wrong with them while you are on the field, and the Peace Corps doesn't want to have to pay to send you back to the USA to have it dealt with."

I had my wisdom teeth removed because I did have a problem--they were pushing forward on my other teeth and un-doing all the straightening I'd had done with braces. And to think that I had 4 molars removed before even getting the braces on! In my case, the recovery was not all that bad. I had it done first thing in the morning, and was actually out getting dinner at a restaurant when the oral surgeon called to check up on me that evening. LOL.

[Arduinna]

I'm in my forties and have repeatedly had dentists try and remove my wisdom teeth for no valid reason. I did have one removed because it did become impacted when it was coming in and was excrutiatingly painful. I still have my others, even though every dentist I've been to has recommended I have them removed.

[lookatreestar]

i had mine cut out, they were coming in crooked and i already had my teeth fixed with braces. recovery wasn't bad at all. my little sister had all 4 of hers come in just fine so she is keeping them! i also had a very crowded mouth, i had 4 other molars pulled.

[Oubliette8]

I still have mine, but only because I fought for them. Everyone I knew had them removed in high school prophylactically, including all of my younger sisters. They did take awhile to fully come in and "settle" - a period of years, but they're fine now.

I did get one removed, and may need another removed. But I consider that an iatrogenic problem- they got cavities and rather than FILL them, like you would with any other cavity in a young, healthy 20 something, every dentist I saw insisted on wanting to pull them. I refused and kept looking. Unfortunately, by the time I found a dentist willing to fill them for me, and had the money to get it done, the cavities had grown considerably larger. One got filled, the other was deemed unfillable and I left it until it got so large that the tooth was literally breaking apart. When I went to get it pulled the brought me a consent form to pull all four- and when I refused to sign it the attendant actually tried to convince me it was "just in case you want the other three pulled later on". Needless to say, I made her redo the form and consented to ONLY the bad tooth being removed. The pulling wasn't bad at all, I went in, he yanked, and out it came. I didn't even fill the painkiller prescription he gave me, ibuprofen took care of it. The dentist who referred me asked why I didn't want it out, and I pointed out it would leave a big gap where my tooth used to be and he tried to argue that there would be no such gap? Sorry, but its been a few years and there is definitely a gap there.

My other tooth the filling is not holding, it got refilled earlier this year (and the dentist whined the whole time about what a bad patient I was to make him do such a difficult filling- um, thats your JOB) I'm hoping it holds now, but it doesn't seem likely. If it doesn't, they've already told me they cannot fill it again, there's not enough tooth left.

I'm convinced though, that if they'd both been filled when the cavities where small, both teeth would still be good today. It really irritates me that it took so much effort to find someone to get them filled because most dentists refuse to do anything but pull them.

The other two (both bottom) teeth are fine. I'm sure if the last upper goes, they'll try to convince me to have the bottoms out as well- they tried to pull it last time because they seem to think every tooth needs to have a correlating upper tooth. But its not happening. I'm sure that if they were pulling, say a regular molar, they wouldn't be so eager to pull its corresponding upper or lower at the same time, and I expect my wisdom teeth to get the same consideration.