# The dentist and DP



## invisible.ink (Feb 2, 2007)

I went to the dentist today and had a very painful procedure done without pain medication. It was excruciated. I became DP'ed quite literally out of my mind. Everything was spinning and I almost got to the point where I had no idea what was going on. It was quite frightening. I think there is a connection between extreme physical pain and becoming depersonalized.


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## Pollyanna 3098 (Dec 12, 2006)

Just curious, why did you chose not to have any pain medication?

3098


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## comfortably numb (Mar 6, 2006)

There definatly is a connection between pain and depersonalization as i have experienced this myself. I have a rather painful condition which i dont like to discuss on the board as i like to keep some thing's private.

When i didnt have any painkiller's on hand or the pain was just to bad to be able to control it my dp became about a 100 times worse. Id feel as if i was totally out of my body sometimes and just floating above myself.

This kind of depersonalization was not totally unwelcome however because it took my mind off the pain just a tiny bit and thus making the pain a little bit more bearable. I guess this lend's to the theory that depersonalization is sometimes atleast a defense mechanism against stressful or painful event's.

Unfortunatly when i would go through really severe bout's of pain the depersonalization would stick around much longer then the pain.

Ink you probley should have taken the painkiller's because they more then likely would have caused less depersonalization then the pain. Im guessing they offered you nitrous oxide as a painkiller did they? Although this is a dissociative it's a mild one and is generally very pleasant. In fact id say it's one of the most euphoric drug's ive ever taken.

Sometimes they hook you up to a IV and give you sedation or painkiller's that way. Usually for this they use midazolam and occasionally a opiate. Midazolam is a very sedating short acting benzo that is often used for these types of operation's because it relaxes the patient to the point where they dont always have to knock you out.

If nitrous was what they offered you and you didnt want it because you where afraid of the dissociative side effect's most dentist's will let you choose the IV sedation route. It would be very unlikely to aggravate your dp/dr as benzos help alot of peoples dp/dr. If anything it would make your dp/dr better for a short period of time.


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## flat (Jun 18, 2006)

Poor you. If you are allergic to painkillers then my only suggestion is to get totally wasted before going.


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## invisible.ink (Feb 2, 2007)

I did not choose to not have painkillers. They did not allow me to have any. They said the procedure should not be that painful but they ended up spending 3 minutes suctioning blood out of my mouth and my gums are still bleeding on and off. According to her, it'll stop in a few days. Maybe she's a quack.
It was my first time seeing this particular dentist and she was very rough. She was rude as well and I don't think I'll be going to see her again. I've never had a problem with dentists before now.
I went because I was having jaw pain. It feels like my jaw isn't aligned properly and she said it's probably just a wisdom tooth but I tried to explain to her that it's not my mouth that hurts it's my jaw! My mandible! I want a second opinion. Anyway, she ended up giving me a cleaning which involved a spinny metal thing (when I was a kid they used a spinny rubber thing) and it hurt like a bitch. When I stood up I was sweating bullets.
She never actually asked permission to do it, she just started telling me she was going to while she had her hands in my mouth and I wasn't really in a position to speak up but I didn't figure it'd be painful (little did I know...) but it turned out to be excruciating. I wanted to punch her in her face.
And I agree numb: in this case the DP was most welcome. I might've passed out otherwise.


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## Ludovico (Feb 9, 2007)

Two words:

Codeine prescription.


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## comfortably numb (Mar 6, 2006)

Your dentist sound's like a quack and a goddamn sadist to boot. She sound's like one of those dentist's that want to get the job done as fast as possible, with as little trouble to them and to hell with how much pain the patient is in. Also if it was your wisdom tooth that was hurting your jaw a xray should have shown that something was amuck so she may not have a clue at what shes doing either.

Also no dentist that has any bedside manner at all is just gonna do something to you and not give you a choice in wheather you want it done or not.

Id ditch her and find another dentist and get a second opinion. Usually you can tell yourself if your jaw is not aligned properly and a dentist that knows what there at will certainly be able to tell you. I get this feeling sometimes as well and i get a pretty bad pain in the jaw. Ive found that a mix of a anti-inflammatory (advil is the best in my opinion) and a mild opiate such as codeine does the trick quite nicely. Codeine is a fairly good painkiller if you have no tolerance to opiates and it wont aggravate your dp/dr. I havent had this problem in over a year now and with any luck i wont get it again.

I know one person that had a jaw that was way out of line and this caused him alot of pain. He had to have surgery which included having his jaw broke and put back into place. According to him this was as painful as hell afterwards and he couldnt eat for a few month's as well. He had to drink all his meal's through a straw.

Do not get this procedure done unless the pain get's unbearable. It's really a last resort but some greedy dentist's jump the gun because they want the money. My dentist told me to hold off unless the pain got really bad. According to him it's a pretty horrible operation and for some unlucky people it doesent even work.

For now though if your still in pain id go see a doctor or another dentist and get a painkiller to help you through. A codeine prescription such as tylenol #3 would probley be good enough.

Another thing did you get all that bleeding from just a cleaning? If im reading your post right that's fukking insane. Your gum's usually dont bleed at all during a cleaning and if they happen to do they bleed very little and it doesent usually hurt. I have sensitive teeth and my teeth hurt abit during a cleaning but not very much at all and ive never had them bleed afterwards much less bleed that much.


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## Dreamland (Jun 1, 2005)

I'm going to the dentist this coming Tuesday for some crown work and I'm looking forward to it. The dentist never scares me and I actually feel quite relaxed after three shots of novocaine.....drill awayand make my teeth look pretty! It's all in your head, but my dentist is really nice and I've been seeing him for 17 years now.


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## invisible.ink (Feb 2, 2007)

She did take x-rays but I looked at them and they were only of my teeth. You couldn't see my jaw in them at all despite the fact that I indicated that the pain was where my lower jaw connects to my upper jaw.
And yes, all that blood was just from the cleaning. I woke up this morning and my arm and face were covered in blood (probably from me drooling in my sleep). It was insane. I don't think that kind of bleeding was normal because I bled a whole hell of a lot. It was ridiculous. I definitely won't be going to see her again.
The thing that got to me was that she wasn't sure that it was a wisdom tooth causing the pain. She said, "It may be a wisdom tooth." then looked at the xray and said, "Well, you do have a wisdom tooth coming in down here, but I could be wrong." WTF?! I don't think she knew what she was doing.
My jaw pain is not horrible, it's more uncomfortable than anything. Kind of like when you can't get into a comfortable position to sleep, it's like I can't get my mouth into a comfortable position. That's why I believe it isn't aligned correctly. But the pain is not constant; it comes and goes throughout the day. Although, I have no idea what could've caused this because I haven't had any injury to the area and the onset occured out of nowhere just a few days ago. However, it does give me terrible migraines behind my left eye and pain around my left ear. I looked up my symptoms and came up with trigeminal neuralgia, which is a neuropathic disorder. There is some information on it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trigeminal_neuralgia
But that's just me self-diagnosing again. I tend to do that a lot but a lot of things seem to match up. Especially the part about SSRI's soothing the pain because I had the strange eye migraines before starting my Lexapro and it went away after I got on the meds. I just stopped taking them about a week ago and bam! There goes the strange pains in my jaw and the left side of my face. I didn't think about it really until I read that so I could be wrong. I've been thinking about going to see my GP and having my jaw x-rayed.


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## closetome (Nov 16, 2006)

I went to the dentist with dp for some root canal surgery and it actually was really relaxing as it gave me the chance just to breathe and do nothing lol


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## rainboteers (Apr 5, 2005)

I did not read all of this but having shots to numb the area is often your choice and you should do it if you have the chance... do not go back to this dentist... she was not understanding of your needs and thats a bad sign...

as far as the nitrous gas i feel as though i need to warn you that when i had it about a week ago at the dentist it made my dp/r so bad i could hardly stand it... the dentist said this often gives people an out of body experience ... which is when i said get it away and ill take the numbing shots!!!! the shots didnt really hurt and i didnt feel anything even though i still hated every minute of it...

just some advice as i just went to the dentist and it sucks!!!!! hope you have better luck next time..


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2007)

I'm at the dentist tomoz, I'm looking forward too it cos my dentist nice! =P, the only bad part is... I'm gonna have a hole in my tooth filled in and it's gonna cost ?40 quid =*(


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## Guest (Mar 13, 2007)

lol wow that was fun... I was smiling as he was working and he asked why i was smiling... so i started to laugh while in pain... lol, he told me he worried because he's never come across any one who laughs while recieving a filling... I think it was my way of coping; laugh it out =P


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## Dreamland (Jun 1, 2005)

I just came back from the dentist and it was an OK experience, although he did take forever to squeeze the novocaine into my jaw....I though that needle was never coming out! The whole right side of my face is numb, even my ears so I guess he wasn't messing around trying to numb the pain. My jaw jaw and face are going through their own DP experience because they sure as heck don't feel like they're part of me.


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## Nehllah (Oct 8, 2006)

rainboteers said:


> as far as the nitrous gas i feel as though i need to warn you that when i had it about a week ago at the dentist it made my dp/r so bad i could hardly stand it... the dentist said this often gives people an out of body experience ... which is when i said get it away and ill take the numbing shots!!!! the shots didnt really hurt and i didnt feel anything even though i still hated every minute of it...
> .


That's what EVERY person feels with the nitrous gas.


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## Beth (Sep 27, 2004)

> I went because I was having jaw pain. It feels like my jaw isn't aligned properly and she said it's probably just a wisdom tooth but I tried to explain to her that it's not my mouth that hurts it's my jaw!


Not directly related to the post, but is the pain worse in the morning? When my DP is bad I grind my teeth in my sleep and wake up with bad jaw pain of the kind that you describe. I used to think I always had ear-ache in the morning, until I made the connection! So it might be that.


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## invisible.ink (Feb 2, 2007)

Could be. Thanks for sharing that, Beth.


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## Rilke (Dec 22, 2006)

Ink- I work for dentist, have been a dental assistant for 5 years and it sounds like you had a deep cleaning. Your dentist might be a quack but I will tell you it is not common procedure to administer lidocaine injections for that type of cleaning unless they specifically tell you it is a procedure called Scaling and Root Planing. Also, that amount of bleeding is completely normal. It has to do with the inflammation in the gums due to tartar build up- warm salt water rinses promote healing and ease the pain.
Wisdom teeth can cause discomfort in the jaw as the pressure of them erupting begins an infammatory process in the joint. If you don't have space for them my advice would be to have them extracted and see where your jaw pain is after that. If it continues teeth grinding would be the next possible cause and there are a variety of night time splints that can ease the discomfort. I grind like a champ- a side effect of lexapro and I wear a retainer to help with the jaw symptoms. Also, there is no type of x-ray a doctor can take that will accurately help to diagnose temporal mandibular joint disorders as it is inflammation of the soft tissue and not the bones themselves. If there is anything else you would like to know I'll do my best to answer it.
Rilke


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## comfortably numb (Mar 6, 2006)

Ive had lot's of teeth cleanings done before but i never had any bleeding or really bad pain and my teeth are pretty sensitive. Ive also had some pretty bad tartar build up at times due to not getting regular cleanings and im also a heavy smoker so ive had some pretty deep cleanings to get all that tar off.

So i dunno maybe you have really sensitive gums that bleed alot or your dentist is just a quack.

And ya rilke is right in the fact that TMJ often does not show up on xrays unless it's really bad.

I used to grind my teeth really bad in my sleep but when i started taking elavil that stopped it. Im off the elavil and on clonazepam now so maybe thats having an effect on it. It is a muscle relaxant so that would make sense.

I think elavil and other tricyclic anti-depressants are actually prescribed for the pain of TMJ and other jaw disorders. Muscle relaxants are as well but alot of them are just plain nasty.


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