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Give and get support around quitting

DonnaMarie
Member

Your mouth will thank you when you quit

I, like a lot of smokers, have had oodles of dental work done due to my continued battering of my gums and mouth with the smoke from a stupid cigarette over and over. I have had 2 bridges due to damage. Those both came out over time, and now I'm working on my second round of implants.

That sounds so simple, but think about it - I ruined my gums. I then paid a LOT of money to have bridges that failed. Now I'm paying about $10K for implants. Implants, in case you don't know, require surgery, crowns, and a lot of waiting and visits to the oral surgeon's and then the dentist's office.

I have a partial for the lower part of my mouth. That's partial dentures for those of you who don't know. It replaces 5 teeth that I probably ruined by having my wisdom teeth out and smoking.

Implants - During the multi-visit prep work and surgeries, one of my implants fell out. Probably due to being a smoker. I had another surgery to put it in, and those 2 are now done. Today, I had surgery again because the 2 implants on the left side developed infection, probably related to smoking (though I haven't smoked for a long while). After the prep work for this side, I'll leave the oral surgeon, go back to my dentist, and then get those crowns again. Along the way, there are periods of pretty impressive pain.

At the moment, we're able to afford this financially and time wise, but in the past, and in the future when Richard retires, no way. If I were working full time, I'd be hard pressed to get the time off to have all this work done.

I'd like people who are on the fence about their quit to look into the damage they're doing in their mouths. It's just one more thing we give up by continuing to smoke. Are you willing to have crappy oral health and risk all the stupid procedures I (and many others) have gone through? Have you given any thought to why your teeth are a little loose? You brush, you floss, and you rinse, but you still smoke and negate all the good things you're doing for yourself.

I'm done preaching. I just find myself taking pain meds and antibiotics today after what I hope is the last of the oral surgery pieces of this last set of implants.

Please don't smoke and if you do, please quit.

Donna

Day 203 (which my oral surgeon thinks is very cool)

5 Replies
sweetplt
Member

Donna I feel for you...I too have had much dental work through the years...I find the Dentist to be the most painful...My teeth have had problems from smoking and from lung inhalers...both weaken your teeth...rest and feel better...~ Colleen 

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Strudel
Member

Powerful, and important message, Donna! Thanks! 

DonnaMarie
Member

Somehow, this needs to become important to new quitters, especially. We/they all think of their lungs, but we forget that we're damaging so much of our bodies with cigarettes.

Donna

Day 203

ernielove
Member

Thanks, Donna for your story and inspiration. I've just signed up on this site today and have set a quit date for the 22nd of July and may just do so sooner. Any advice for me? I just bought a pack and I'm trying to limit myself to 3 cigarettes a day till quit day. What did you find to be helpful? The patch or just cold turkey? Would love advice.

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AnnetteMM
Member

Dental issues are the WORST! You can't enjoy life at all when everything you eat or drink hurts. And it's so not fair! No one talked about what smoking would do to our teeth. It's like we were half-a$$ed prepared for COPD but never even considered losing our teeth.  I'll be interested to know how you make out with the implants once it's all done.  Good luck!

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