I learned some sad news the day I wrote my previous post. A woman had been killed by a driver while she was participating in the Tripleshot CrossFondo. The news article a co-worker showed me on his monitor mentioned it was a woman in her 40s. I ran down to the bike shop to ask a colleague I knew had volunteered at the event if he knew who it was. Several of the ladies I ride with are in their 40s. Hell, I am a female rider in her 40s! (Only Danica texted me in a panic to see if I was still alive.)
I recognized the name. It wasn’t any of the ladies in the WhatsApp group I belong to, but it was someone I’d followed on Strava for a while. I was sure our paths would eventually cross. But now she is gone, and the cycling community is devastated. Several of the ladies I ride with knew this woman personally. I didn’t feel better about it not being anybody I knew: this was downright awful news.
I was still processing the news when I wrote the October 21st post. Later that night, I lay in the dark next to Jordi in my bed, and tears escaped the corner of my eyes. I’d taken a break from cycling to give myself time to heal from the trauma of my accident, and now it had been reawakened. I got lucky and walked away from getting hit by a car, fucking up my mouth in the process. And this poor woman didn’t make it.
As per this post’s title, Tooth #11 has been extracted from my mouth. My dental implant surgery was on Thursday morning. It was unpleasant, to say the least. I was expecting to get laughing gas in conjunction with local anesthesia. Instead, I only got the latter–and a lot of it. The worst part was when the dentist stuck the needle through the middle of the roof of my mouth, and it penetrated my sinus cavity. I bet you grimaced just now.
The dentist’s assistant gave me sunglasses to shield my eyes from the operatory lamp. I ended up closing my eyes for most of the procedure as it was unnerving seeing all the crazy implements he was using in my mouth. Once my nose and jaw were good and numb, the dentist finally yanked out the dead tooth that had been complicating my ability to chew for the past 4+ months. I expected this tooth to come out with relative ease. It did not. Then, during the process of ripping and cutting open my front gums, shoving two titanium rods in the cavities and rebuilding the alveolar process that cracked when I lost tooth #21, I could feel the headrest of the dentist’s chair springing back. I could feel blood trickle out of the corners of my mouth.
The procedure took an hour and a half. I was instructed to start taking antibiotics and painkillers as soon as I got home. The lidocaine started wearing out as I hurriedly made a smoothie to take with the medication, and it stung. The pain has been minimal ever since. In fact, my mouth feels much more comfortable without tooth #11. The dentist retrofitted my flipper to fill in the void left behind by the freshly extracted tooth.
Of course, I asked for my tooth back. Technically, I still have my front teeth:
And my recovery journey continues. At least I’m closer to being able to eat pizza again.
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