I didn’t make it to the farmers market this morning. I woke up feeling yucky, went back to bed for a few hours, woke up again not feeling like bothering with it. It wasn’t going to be as much fun without Lin. The trips to the market are something we have always done together and is very much one of our regular “just us” activities. We do a lot of real talking together on the drive, we always get coffee and a snack together, we always pick out our food for the coming two weeks together, and we have fun together. It felt weird thinking about going by myself. Maybe that seems silly, but we all have our rituals. Until I started getting ready to go, I didn’t really realize this was one of our rituals, but I think it is.

That, and I am entirely too lazy to feel like carrying a metric-buttload of meat and fresh veggies around in a large canvas bag by myself. I need my man-servant to do the heavy lifting and hauling. ;)

So now I have a week to be creative with the meats we still have in the freezer. Well, at least I can eat them now. Yes, I am declaring myself able to get back to eating regular foods. Last night I finished off three pieces of pizza without problems. I had to go at it slowly, but I can chew real food again.

Most of the need to go slowly at it has more to do now with having to relearn how to eat. That probably sounds crazy, but things have changed in my mouth and with my jaw. A lot of it is that I have to just have faith that digging into a bite of food and chewing it isn’t going to cause pain. It doesn’t, but it used to, and my mind just keeps waiting for something to hurt. It’s a lot like after I had a broken ankle. Even though I knew it was healed, that it didn’t hurt to use it, I was still favoring it and somewhat afraid to really go at things … like walking briskly or trotting up stairs. I was perfectly capable of doing so, and it wasn’t going to harm me to do so, but it had hurt for a long time while, and it felt strange to suddenly be able to use it and rely on it again. Well, it’s the same way with my teeth and jaw now. Particularly my jaw joint, which had caused me pain while chewing for ages.

I keep expecting it to hurt. It doesn’t. At all. In fact, it feels so good, I can’t believe it! No weird snapping noises while I am talking or eating. No sharp pains from out of nowhere. Best of all, when I eat or drink really cold things, I no longer have to be careful not to let it get back by that wisdom tooth that is no longer there. See, due to the way it came in and its wacky roots screwing up my jaw, any time anything cold got anywhere near it, there would be the worst kind of pain. It was the sort of pain that just shoots through your head like someone had smacked me in the head with a pick ax. Last night I got brave, and I took a big bite of ice cream and rolled it around in my mouth until my whole mouth was freezing cold and the ice cream was melted. No pain at all. None. I almost cried, because I have been dealing with that particular problem since I was in my twenties. Still, I have to teach myself all over again that it’s OK to let cold things go wherever they want in my mouth. My brain expects it to hurt. It’s exciting though, knowing that all that pain is gone and I am not going to have that problem anymore.

Also, people keep telling me my voice sounds different. I don’t believe them, but too many people have commented on it, even people who don’t know I just had a bunch of work done on my teeth and jaw. I guess later this week I’ll make a recording of myself and compare it to older recordings. I can see how it might be true. Things are a lot different in my mouth now.

I’ve decided that next weekend we will be going out to eat somewhere to celebrate my mouth’s return to normalcy. At the rate everything is healing up, by next weekend, I should be able to eat a real meal without it taking me forever to get through it. :D

Nothing much going on around here today. Lin is at work sweating his butt off outside, the cats are having a day-of-sleep, I’m feeling puny and lazy, and the housework is mostly caught up. In other words, I am about to be bored to tears. I’ve sort of been stuck in the house for too long, but I don’t really feel energetic enough to go do anything. Not anything by myself anyway. That would be boring too. I guess I’ll go take a nice hot shower, putter around in the yard, and then lay around like a lazy couch potato until Lin gets home.