When this happens to someone else, I will totally say OH HONEY, SHUT UP AND DRINK YOUR PROTEIN. THIS AIN'T MY FIRST RODEO.

True story: 2012 is not off to a glowing start. Unless you call experimenting with the food processor to see what retains its flavor when pureed, a good time. I do not.

This will forever be remembered as the time I starved myself and learned all about chompers. I've been unable to think straight for the last week, but here's what I recall.

Around the new year, I began experiencing headaches and jaw pain, for which I took Advil and muscled through. I'm no stranger to headaches, I grew up with seven of them. But eventually I sought out my dentist, who found nothing. I didn't question him, because I've no reason not to. Plus he's funny and he likes to narrate the Food Network, especially when they cook with lentils. Who cares about lentils? I digress. I then went to my MD, who said it was TMJ and gave me anti-inflammatories. At that point I was already having trouble eating, and was on a self-imposed liquid diet to reduce the pain. Leave it to the girl who started her workout regimen in November to avoid looking like one of those people who makes new year's resolutions about getting in shape. Instead, I sat on my couch while my friends ate Panda Express, making myself feel better by saying things like GREAT IDEA! I'LL JUST SIT HERE ON MY ASS AND LOSE WEIGHT. WAY TO GO, SELF.

The jaw pain was like nothing I'd ever felt, a sharp and nauseating pain that I could predict based on how much talking/eating I'd done. (And if you think it's funny to make a joke about how this must've happened because I talk a lot,  you can join the club. Then get lost.) Girls night, that was a real kick. A few bleu cheese fries and I spent the next 10 minutes holding my Long Island Iced Tea to my face.

Eventually the pain morphed into an intense, radiating feeling beneath one of my molars. Nerve pain is the worst, especially when you know it's because it's totally getting ready to leave you, and this is their way of making sure you don't forget all the great times you had. Cue a day spent on the couch, my mouth propped open, unable to swallow without pain, watching dumb movies while icing my jaw.

P.S. Dumb movies without fatty and sugary snacks, are that much worse. Or better, depending on which way you look at it. Mandy Moore, eat your heart out.

My roommate is one of those who self-diagnoses every problem by looking it up on WebMD, so her money was on the twin growing behind my ear. Or certain death, in which case she suggested drilling a hole in my temple. No problem, she totally saw it on Grey's Anatomy. 

She needs her own reality show.

The next morning was a bit of a blur. It started out in the dentist's office, then I cried, then I saw the endodontist, who broke the news that I needed a root canal and prescribed some strong meds in the meantime. Now, I'm not a huge painkiller person, but these ones were FASCINATING in that they rendered me completely rational, relaxed me to the point of agreeing with everything you say, and unusually tolerant of certain TV shows. 

I watched The Bachelor, people.

Of course those same meds also made me nauseous, so there I was: hungry but unable to eat, and also unable to take meds unless I had food in me. A terribly mean trick to play on someone, especially when I've more than paid my dentist tithe in years past. Who prescribes meds I can't take unless I want to vomit? Which is also super painful BY THE WAY.  I want to find out in what counter-intuitive vicious world he lives, because I am blowing that shit wide open.

I never thought I'd be so thrilled to get a root canal, but I practically danced into that office. Upon leaving, the assistant warned me that I might experience some discomfort in the form of achy, sore gums but I was all LADY, COMPARED TO THE WEEKEND I JUST HAD, UNLESS I POP OUT A KID OR A HERNIA I'M FAIRLY CERTAIN IT CAN ONLY GO UP FROM HERE.


She said I made an excellent point.