dental prosthesis

I've mentioned that I had as broken tooth extracted. This leaves a space which has to heal for a period of several months until an implant can be placed. In the meantime, there's a gap, and to keep the neighboring teeth from moving over and filling the gap I've been given a prosthesis. This isn't just an artificial tooth to fill up the hole; the artificial tooth is embedded in a hard plastic device that fits over my entire upper teeth and was made by taking a putty impression of my bite.

I can't eat with this thing in, and I'm not expected to wear it more than half the time. I've been putting it in after dinner and leaving it there until breakfast, taking it out briefly if I have a late-night snack. It's very snug, hard to get in place and equally hard to remove. I've been assured it will loosen over time, and even after only several days I'm noting a bit of that, just a bit. It's transparent and close to invisible from outside unless you look closely, and it doesn't interfere much with my speaking, though yesterday when I told B. I had been watching the old movie Mr. Deeds Goes to Town she thought I'd said Mr. Bean.

And that's going to be my duty for the next few months. This is just one of the medical regimens that shape my life right now, but it's the easiest to write about.