On Friday, February 13th, I took the day off work to have my wisdom teeth extracted. I tried not to set expectations about the recovery because I know the healing process varies greatly from patient to patient. However, I couldn't help being influenced by Duffy repeating his experience that he didn't swell and was playing basketball later the same day. I don't remember the part where he told me he only had the top two removed (which are supposed to be much less problematic than the bottom teeth), so I was hopeful for recovery in a few days, and being back at work on Monday. Bottom line- I didn't want to use any more of my coveted PTO/sick days from work to lay around the house doped up and looking like a chipmunk. 

What I remember before going under was the nurse putting some jelly on my ankles and wrists, then clamping on metal bracelets/anklets on me (to keep track of vital signs I guess). Then she strapped on the face mask and said, "You might start to feel a little fuzzy now. The doctor will be in shortly." Then I caught the giggles and could not stop!!! It was soooo funny! The laughing gas was actually making me laugh. For some reason thinking this thought made it even funnier, so I giggled harder. All the while the staff in the room were not laughing at all (probably annoyed by my laughter), which, you guessed it, made me laugh even harder! 

Duffy was wise enough to bring along the camera on the big day and capture me fresh off the laughing gas. I think it's hilarious as each time I remember how funny it was that ..."The laughing gas really makes you laugh!"  Sure enough... it was about the only thought I had as soon as I breathed it's sweet tastelessness. Here is a clip in the doctor's office (in the designated "sleeping it off" area).

And here, in the car on the way home. I was kind of a chatterbox until Duffy asked the real penetrating questions like, "What do you want to do tonight?" That's when I look up with real questioning in my eyes as if it were the most penetrating question in the world to which I have almost no answer (except "play with Harper!" - said with my kindergarten, no "r"s speech). 

If you're dying to know exactly what I said, just give me a call... I think I understand most of it.

After getting home I followed all of the doctor's orders: pain pills every 4-6 hours as needed (with food, which was the hard part), drink plenty of fluids, get lots of rest, and ice for twenty minutes throughout the day for the first two days.

Well how else in the world was I supposed to ice both cheeks at the same time?

As always, Harper was there for me in all his cute-n-cuddliness. He loves to nap all day, so I'm sure he enjoyed having someone else to sleep the day away with. Something you'll notice is that he is laying half on the couch and half on the love-sac. This is something Harper really enjoys, but we aren't quite sure why. 

Something else you may not know about Harper is that he's very helpful around the house, and even with work! On one of my days at home, I got up to refill on my meds and he decided to keep tabs on work for me while I was away from the compy. 

I wanted to wait until I had recovered 100% to post these things and really let the world (or my small blog following community) laugh at them, but that is taking entirely too long. Maybe I'll give you the details later, but it's really not a great story. I had, I mean HAVE, a persistent infection which is delaying my recovery. We're hoping that the four week mark will bring me back to 100%.  In the meantime, I will continue my 3 week+ streak of taking pills every six hours. (And for those of you trying also trying to ration PTO, just be glad you didn't have to spend a total of FIVE of them on something this un-fun.)