This afternoon I had to break away from being the maintenance guy as I had appointments with my Dentist, the Vet and the Doctor. By the way whilst it is true that I suffer from many varied, interesting and quite harmless ailments (see my previous blog) the visit to the Vet was regarding the cat and not me. It was indeed nice to be visiting a Doctor in a non-emergency setting and made a pleasant change. Claire thinks that if you could get 'Air-Miles' for how often you visit the casualty Dept then I would have been able to get to Hong Kong and back!
This is a little unfair, I feel, as most of my visits, well if not most then the majority were in relation to a spell of dislocated jaw incidents. I say a 'spell' but the spell did go on for many years averaging about twice a year and there are still occasions now when it has been very close to re-occurring. You see I had a nasty head on car crash and my head took quite a hit against the side of my car as it spun 180 degrees in the road. Several smashed teeth were testament to the fact that my jaw took one hell of a whack and it was not long after that the jaw dislocations started. Most of my family can recall the first time with some clarity as we were playing Scrabble. My son was just about to place a seven letter word on the board and I started a yawn that resulted in one side of my jaw dropping out of position, preventing me from closing it. I had no idea what was happening as my power of speech simply stopped and I entered a world of "Ugg" language in which the only word I could utter was "Ugg" immediately putting me back several millennia in the communications front. My family gathered around the scrabble board were just as flummoxed by this strange behaviour of mine putting it down to me being, well just me I suppose. Then there was a secondary spasm and 'Pop' the other side of the jaw came undone which, I think, was when they realised something was really wrong, that and me desperately writhing around on the sofa trying to shut my jaw in some pain.
Now my wife enters from the kitchen having heard much of a cur-fuddle and takes one look at my face which I was holding with both hands either side giving a pretty good impersonation of Edvard Munch's The Scream.....
My grotesque disposition had the none to helpful effect of making her wretch and off she went into the hall to continue with her wretching. Being the only other adult in the building I have to say that this did nothing to aid my confidence that there would be a quick and swift resolution to this strange affair. I lay there with my Daughter looking on aghast, my wife about to blow chunks in the hall and my son tenaciously insisting that he puts down his first ever 7 letter word to ensure he got the bonus 50 points! The only person who seemed to keep her calm was my God-Daughter, whom was staying with us, although she appeared more interested in how 'cool' it all was.
Eventually Alison managed to compose herself and took me off to hospital where a rather strong nurse used all her body weight to re-locate the thing. It does take some muscle and a knowledge of exactly which directions to pull then push the jaw to get it back again.
Out-patient appointments were made, doctors seen and by luck our nearest hospital was the Queen Victoria in East Grinstead which was where the ground breaking achievements were made in World War II re-constructing Spitfire Pilots faces after crashes As a result they have the best Maxillofacial Dept in the country. In short their the people! They told me to come in to the Department next time it happens so they can X-Ray the jaw whilst it is in its dislocated position. Sounded like a good plan at the time, only when it actually happened I turn up to a heaving waiting room with an imposing appointments secretary between me and the Doctors and all I could say to her was.... "Ugg" whilst offering up, in an uncontrollable way, a little gift of a string of dribble.
For all intensive purposes I appeared to be someone with certain 'special needs' and no 'owner'. I had never played charades up to this point in my life but I firmly believe that it was this incident alone that has enabled me to swiftly knock off a charade of Captain Corelli's Mandolin or Stanley Gibbons Commonwealth and British Empire Stamps catalogue, which is a tough book to do I can tell you! Eventually having made myself understood with the help of a pen and some scraps of post it pads I was taken in for X-rays, not that it achieved much as my jaw continued to dislocate for many more years.
Twice my jaw dislocated even as I yawned at the crack of dawn on my way to work in the car. The most notable of these was on a dark wet and windy winters morning at about 6am. The weather was foul, great gusts of wind throwing rain around as if by the bucket loads and to add to the misery great flashes of lighting fully illuminating the sky followed by chest rumbling thunder claps. AND THEN POP WENT MY JAW and I had to turn off my path to work and head for the hospital instead.
It was the same hospital as above but being out of hours all I could do would be to get to the Accident and emergency Department. Eventually I pulled up into the car park near the entrance to the A&E I elected to just put my heavy rain coat over my head and shoulders as it was just a short run to the door. The Lightning and Thunder flashed overhead as the rain whipped across the entrance door, I gave the door a firm shoulder as I was in a rush to get in and was thoroughly winded as it refused to budge. I tried the other door of the pair, nothing, they were both locked. There was a sign. There is always a sign isn't there. I remember at the time of the cuts in Maggie Thatchers days someone had put signs up all around the hospital stating
;
"We regret to announce that the Light at the End of the tunnel has been switched off due to economic restraints"
This sign simply explained that the A&E Dept is open for business and instructed me to ring the bell, which I obediently did. Then again after a minute, and again and again. Nothing. So after about 3 minutes waiting in the pouring rain I felt I owed it to myself to start banging on the door in a polite way with the palm of my left hand as my right was trying to relieve the pressure on my aching jaw.
Now hopefully you can picture the scene, I am hunched over in the pouring rain with my right hand grasping a 'scream' like jaw, my left banging hard on the old Victorian Oak door with my coat over my head and shoulders like a cloak whilst in the blackness of night rain whiplashes me and the door and all of this being accompanied by flashes of lightning and cracks of thunder. Finally the nurse arrives at the port hole style window and takes a peek through only to see this vision straight out of a Count Dracula movie. She tentatively asks what it is I need and all she gets back by way of a reply is "Ugg, Ugg, Ugg"! Followed by another dramatic flash of lightning illuminating my twisted, grotesque jaw line.........
So Today I have been to the Dentist who has doubled my worth by adding to my assets to the value of one gold crown, that's the tooth cap not the pre-decimal coin called a 'Crown'. I now look like one of the baddies on James bond, or a bouncer and when I have my photograph taken there will be a golden starlight twinkle from my toothy smile:)
Then I went to the Vets for the cats Thyroid pills and finally ending up at the Doctors for some ear drops as I have gained an infection from when we went to Center Parcs a few weeks back.
To be honest I can't be sure that it is an infection and my belief is that it is another bloody Ladybird that has crawled into my ear to hibernate!
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