Dry Socket

I thought I had a dry socket, so I searched the Internet for pictures of a dry socket to compare with the stinking hole in the back of my own mouth. I couldn't find any. Therefore I will describe to the best of my ability what a dry socket (for that's what the stinking hole turned out to be) looks like so that other recent victims of wisdom-tooth extraction will know whether their extraction site has become a dry socket. It was bluish white and wormy looking, with a dark gaping hole to the side. When I squirted water on it to wash some food away, it stung. In short, it was gross. The dentist put a packet of nasty tasting herbs in the hole, and he says that will make it better.

Everything I read on the Internet said that a dry socket should cause screaming pain, but mine just ached a little when I thought about it. Either they don't always hurt, or I've inherited my mother's high pain tolerance. She didn't take any pain medication when she gave birth to me and my brother because she said it didn't hurt that bad: "Well," she admits, "when you actually came out, that kinda hurt, I guess." When my sister was born, my mom took some Tylenol.

Also for women to remember is that estrogen slows clotting, so we should have our teeth extracted during the blank-pill part of our cycle because birth control pills really increase the risk of dry socket. My dentist did not tell me this. I might not have a stinking hole in the back of my mouth right now if he had.