Toothache worse than labour! Talk me off the edge

[mawof3soontobe]

Currently 32 weeks pregnant with DC3 and I hands down have the WORST toothache I have ever known in my entire life (and I've had a tooth knocked out accidentally).
Went to the dentist yesterday who gave me antibiotics as she suspects internal infection. I've now taken two full days of antibiotics and I'm taking the maximum dose of soluble paracetamol which isn't even touching it!
My poor DP thought I was in labour yesterday watching me pace floors moaning and howling like a deranged animal!!! I NEED RELIEF ASAP! How the hell do I get through this pain?! I would gladly give birth weekly over this! I have a very high pain threshold and have given birth twice drug free but JFC this is horrific!
Someone give me a remedy safe in pregnancy? HELP!!

I’m assuming we are talking NHS here. As with all NHS services, dentistry is massively underfunded and demand far outweighs supply. I would always do my best to see someone in pain straight away, but diaries are already overbooked, and patients complain about only getting ten minute appointments or the dentist running late. Add an unplanned appointment into that and things get very difficult. Everyone with booked appointments has to wait an extra 20-30 mins in the waiting room for the dentist to see the emergency patient. A surprising amount of people get angry about this! It’s not how anyone would want things of course but unfortunately that is the state of our chronically underfunded national heath service.

I went through the same when my wisdom tooth got infected. The pain was indescribable and I couldn't eat / talk properly for days. You poor lady, on top of being 3rd trimester pregnant. I really feel for you.
For me, the antibiotics did kick in on day 4 and whilst the pain didn't vanish overnight it did get increasingly better after then. Also as a side note I was prescribed co-codamol whilst pregnant for a pulled muscle in my chest.

The doctor had to check in a medical dictionary but she said it was considered safe.
Sending you healing thoughts

I've had an appointment (routine check up) cancelled on the day to fit a pain patient in - I was called and asked if I minded and I didn't at all. Same dentist fitted me in when I was in pain and they have signs up saying this is what they do. I love my NHS dentist!

OP - can you find a private one to see you today if you can afford it? Or call 111 and say they can't fit you in. My area also has an emergency dental line accessible via 111.

I'm still pain free at the moment so that's been a good twelve hours, I'm trying my absolute utmost to avoid any contact or temperature extremes to that side of my mouth and hoping to god it doesn't come back tonight!

I’d go to a private dentist OP. It’ll be worth the money from the sound of it!

Just not an option for me I'm afraid

Get yourself some solpadeine.
Codeine is fine in pregnancy and I took out through both of mine for an ongoing medical condition. And mine were stronger than the counter ones.
If not try oraljel or cloveoil

Op, the only time I have ever seen my dh cry is when he had a horrendous toothache. Absolutely nothing worked . He begged the dentist to remove the offending tooth
I also had a toothache when pregnant with my second child
It was definitely worse than labour. I don’t even drink alcohol, but had to gargle with whisky and vodka to get some relief.
I eventually had the tooth removed

When I was pregnant I was prescribed co-dydromal for severe chest pain. Way better than paracetamol that didn’t touch the sides. X

Oh god your poor thing. It is utterly 😩
I had a dry socket after removal of a wisdom tooth and the pain was SO bad I genuinely considered smacking my head into the wall to knock myself out. On relaying this info to Dh, he thought out of hours dentist a better idea. Hadn’t slept for 3 days at this point. Dentist shot my gum full of anaesthetic so I could get some sleep. God I loved that woman!
Cost me £90 but frankly she could have had my whole fucking house for all I cared at that point. Best £90 I ever spent.
Can you have local anaesthetic when pregnant?
Good luck anyway x

I stayed late and saw a pain patient at 5pm last week- I felt sorry for him. My nurse agreed to stay (she puts a time sheet in so would get paid).
I’m private though so he did pay around £100 to be seen and have his tooth accessed and dressed. I did spend 45 minutes on him.
I’m disappointed they refused to see you. When I was NHS I would have seen you on a sit and wait and run late. If people moan about NHS running late they can go elsewhere IMO, they are lucky to have an NHS place!
Hope you get sorted soon.

Yes local is safe when pregnant

Cost me £90 but frankly she could have had my whole fucking house for all I cared at that point.

@captainbuttock honest to God, that’s a fairly accurate description of how I felt too!

Teeth are totally amazing and robust when you think about it. But if they do get compromised and pulp gets inflamed, that hard enamel shell that means they function well to grind food works against us, as there’s nowhere for swelling tissues to spread to! 😭😭😭

@sfb182 I’m sure you, as a qualified dentist, are delighted with someone telling you how pulpitis works! You handled that very gracefully, I must say.

Lots of dentists on here, here’s a chat thread.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/doctors_nurses_and_other_hcps_chat_/3507526-Dentists-and-DCPs-in-here

Hope the pain has gone now OP

Please be careful with paracetamol dosage

Thanks everyone for your support whilst I rant like a deranged nutter! I've thankfully been pain free all day today but have started to notice very slight pressure/pulsing in the tooth when I lean forward to pick things up etc. I've had one dose of paracetomol at 4:30pm today so I'm going to leave five hours between and take another which will hopefully give me a pain barrier to stop it getting to that level of extreme again. Hoping this is antibiotics now taking effect!

Ha ha, thanks piglet89. I may have explained it once or twice before!

Hope tonight is going better than last night!

Can pulpits resolve without any kind of drilling intervention to receive the pressure ?

How are you doing OP?

This was me a few weeks ago - an infection in a badly broken molar coupled with an impacted wisdom tooth on the same side. I was going absolutely insane but my fear of dentists is so bad I still haven’t gone. It subsided and now I’m trying to get the courage before it flares up again.

For reference, I’m already on morphine for another condition and took my maximum known safe dose and it didn’t touch it.

Only things that helped were:
Paramol (over the counter) - paracetamol and dihydracodeine, strongest thing you can buy. I had dihydracodeine prescribed in pregnancy (and morphine which I took every day) and I know that a pharmacist will not sell it to a pregnant woman, but that doesn’t mean you can’t send someone else if you’re absolutely out of your mind

Ibuprofen - again, tricky for you being pregnant but I was prescribed it during pregnancy

Orajel (strong version, 20%) - helped somewhat

Swishing the hottest salt water I could stand around my mouth

Weirdly, rubbing ice between my thumb and forefinger - read it online and it really helped give temporary relief

Alternating ice and heat packs on my face

If you have another night like that, go to A&E - they may not be able to treat your teeth but they can certainly give a pregnant woman in agony some proper bloody pain relief. It’s absolutely disgraceful that we allow people to suffer like this just because it’s teeth

Co-codamal and ibuprofen together was the only thing that touched my wisdom tooth infection. Can you take them in pregnancy? I'm not sure. Antibiotics didn't kick in until the 4th day of taking them - it was horrendous. I took to holding an ice block against my face to numb it. Didn't sleep for a week... You have my sympathies xx

Toothache is one of the worst pains. Along with passing a kidney stone. And childbirth. Fact.

And blown ear drum on a flight

I would take 4 back to back labours over that

Haven't RTFT, but feel compelled to write because I was in the exact same situation just before my son was born. To make matters worse I had been to the dentist some months prior, and they hadn't spotted the problem, even though I mentioned mild occasional pain. It kicked off a few days before I was due - a really bad cavity with infection - and the pain was unbearable. Utterly unbearable. I ended up going to the after hours' clinic and the divine GP there referred me directly to A&E and arranged a registrar from the dentistry team to see me. They ummed and ahed a bit, but finally pulled it. I have never felt more relieved in my life. I went into labour later that evening and my son was born the evening after. Labour was intense and yes, painful, but it's a useful sort of pain, and I'd take it any day over that toothache.

You have my utter sympathies. It felt to me like utter despair and was so upset that nobody seemed to want to deal with it. If that GP hadn't been on call and I hadn't been seen, I don't know how I would have coped. So, keep pursuing the emergency medicine angle. It IS an emergency. The pain is putting stress on your body and can induce labour. Please be super careful with paracetamol. It is REALLY serious to have anything over maximum dosage. Don't. Also, obviously you can't take Ibuprofen, but am sure you know that already. I was prescribed Tramadol, but never had to take it because they extracted the tooth. I would, in your position, fight for an extraction. The pain isn't worth it, and it seems they aren't giving you any definitive info about what it could be. Being taken seriously as a dental emergency in the public system is really dependent on visible swelling (related to abscess), or at least this, was my experience in NZ - so dramatise / pretend you have swelling if need be, and emphasise the pregnancy aspect.

What helped me in short-term....? Well, not much. I tried most of the remedies suggested above to no avail. As last ditch, I tried rubbing whisky into the gum, which helped briefly (figured it wasn't likely I'd get any actual alcohol absorption. I also rubbed sensodyne toothpaste directly into the sore bit, which seemed to help a little, though not much by the end. The topical pain relief injection before the dentist yanked mine was the best feeling in the world. Good luck - I know how you feel.

how are you doing today maw?