I've been scammed.

I've been waiting in anticipation for the pain to come.

Almost everyone I asked who had braces said it was painful. And I wanted to feel it.

But I never did.

It's just discomfort, but no pain at all. Um if you pinch me, I feel pain. If you kick my cello, I'll feel pain. But braces are painless.

Okay that aside, I feel like a baby now. I can't eat properly, and I can't talk properly. Don't get me wrong, its not that braces are painful. But the dentist stuck this piece of hard white thingy in my mouth, and I can't close my mouth properly.

Take a look at my awesome mouth: there is it, right at the end.
Yeah T_T its like sticking something at the entrance of the door. One small corner is blocked, but the entire door cannot close properly. I can't even clench my teeth together, so everything I eat has to be liquid. And everything I talk has to be gibberish.

Try it for yourself. Open your mouth, make sure your teeth does not touch each other during the entire process, and say this out loud: She sells sea shells on the sea shore.

Okay you get what I mean :)

My dentist said that if she doesn't put that white thingamajig there, my upper tooth will bite off the bracket on my lower tooth. According to her, the white thingy will slowly dissolve and after that it will be fine.

But it has been 3 days, and that white blob still looks as big as ever.

I've been scammed.

This is it. I have da cool new cool braces.

It's going to stay with me for about 3 years, throughout my entire jaw operation, pre-op and post-op.

And its quite funny cos its not "braced" all the way. My middle lower tooth doesn't have a bracket on it. It's quite an eyesore actually, like a chess set with a missing pawn or a piano with a G# chipped off.

My awesome dentist said the most people would feel pain for about a week or so, but judging by the state of my teeth and the 3871878951 adjustments she made to it, she predicted the pain would last about 10 to 14 days for me.

I just brushed my teeth, and it was rather tedious x) Right now it still feels okay, some discomfort here and there, but no pain. Maybe the pain might come on Sunday morning and I would have to pangsei my stand-partner and not play for BHCO concert xP

Sigh, and everyone has been all around the world this holidays. The most exciting place I've been to is probably the hospital or the cinema. And in both places, I sit on a chair and do nothing.

Okay here's an update on the operation. It's long, but you won't want to miss this post. There's a nice picture at the end :)

Prelude
Here was the initial plan:
Thursday (11/ 12) Extract 4 wisdom teeth
Monday (21/12) Extract 2 upper canines and put bands
Wednesday (29/12) Put braces

Then, the day before my op, I spoke to my dentist and she said that I might as well take out all 6 teeth at one go (4 wisdom teeth + 2 canines) and then on 21/12 I can straightaway put braces. My surgeon said its my choice, she can do it, as long as I'm willing to handle the pain T_T

As the Chinese saying goes 长痛不如短痛. Yeah and I so gave the green light.

The Op
The operation was full of trauma.

Firstly, I had over 20 injections inserted in my mouth. Its about 3-4 injections per tooth that's going to be extracted. After all the anesthetic was injected, the extraction of my first wisdom tooth began.

I thought since all the injections were completed, the worst part should be over. Unfortunately, I was wrong. The upper teeth extractions were okay, all went quite smoothly. By smoothly, I meant that the teeth came out in one piece.

The lower teeth gave me hell. Both lower wisdom teeth cracked halfway through the extraction, and so the surgeon had to extract them in parts. And that involved a lot of drilling and sawing :S A LOT D:

Postlude
The few hours after the operation was bad. Like really bad. Because of all the anesthetic, my entire mouth was numb. Plus the right side is swollen and my lips were twitched to one side, so I looked like a stoke patient T_T And there was a lot a lot of blood.

My first meal after the operation was a glass of milk, but drinking that glass of milk took me like 20 minutes, I can't control any muscle in my mouth and my throat muscles were a bit restricted too.

And I suffered from prolonged bleeding, which isn't supposed to happen. The rest of the extraction sites stopped bleeding after 2-3 hours, but my left canine extraction site kept bleeding, and that bleeding continued for more than 24 hours. Well it finally stopped 2 hours ago T_T But throughout the entire yesterday and today morning, I was drinking my own blood.

Dinner yesterday was plain porridge with the sauce from the pickled lettuce can.
Supper was the same.
Breakfast today was oatmeal.
Brunch was Beancurd.
Lunch was plain porridge with pickled lettuce sauce.
Teabreak was plain porridge with pickled lettuce sauce.
No prizes for guessing what my dinner would be later.

Now I guess I'm quite okay, but my right side is still a bit swollen so I look a bit cute :D Hehe no picture of that here, but here's a picture of my extracted teeth!

The first 2 are my upper wisdom teeth, the next 2 are my upper canines. The bottom ones are my lower wisdom teeth, all in pieces T_T

Life has been.. off schedule.

I was supposed to be doing some tutorials, but I'm back to reading Chinese Wuxia novels. Two days ago, my mum ordered me to read a book because she said I haven't read one yet this year. I warned her that once I get started, I wouldn't stop. Now this set of 武侠 comprises of 6 books, I just finished the first book, which I started this morning, and my mum's begging me to stop now.

Anw I guess I will stop reading for the next 2 days, because I need to do some arranging for Chamber CIP. Contrary to popular belief, arranging pieces actually take quite a lot of time. Allocating the parts (on hardcopy) can be done in probably around two hours or so depending on the length of the piece, but typing it on Sibelius is an entire thing altogether. Notating my Happy Birthday compo took me around 6 hours, arranging and notating my sec 4 RE project song took me 3 entire afternoons and nights in the lonely PC lab of RI's Artspace.

Anw I shall control myself, stop reading, and focus on doing some arranging for the next 2 days :) Hopefully I can get enough pieces completed and go for Piano Ensem dinner on Wednesday night.

The twist to the story is that I probably wouldn't even get to hear my own arrangements being played D: Chamber CIP is on Thursday, and that's when I'm going to go for Phase 1 out of 7 of my epic Jaw surgery: Extracting my wisdom teeth.

Wisdom teeth are basically like your 3rd molars. If you stick your finger into your mouth now, you can probably feel a tooth embedded in the gum behind your second molar. Either that, or your wisdom teeth have already grown out. Anw, the wisdom teeth are located very near the nerves in the cheek and jaw (the nerves that allow you to smile, frown, pout, etc), so in order to minimize danger and risk for phase 5/7 of my surgery, I have to extract the wisdom teeth first.

4 teeth at one go D: If you know that extracting molars are painful, imagine how it would be to extract molars that haven't even grown out yet. Ugh.. its like taking out babies before they are born :S

And all this will be done with my mind being perfectly conscious.

And the worst part is that, I can't eat properly after my op DDDDD: Yet alone 6 meals a day. Operation Get Fat = Fail T_T