teeth Archives - Owl Medicine: Shamanic Healing

Tooth String

Technically this post is not about the floss I got stuck between my molars last night. Can I tell you, though, how maddening it’s been to have my tongue relentlessly trying to dislodge this errant piece of tooth string? All day. Ugh.

Every once in a while I manage to snag with my fingers a shred of the material – and I literally mean a shred – that’s stuck between my teeth.

But the kicker is the pressure I feel between my teeth. You know – that weird achy pressure that’s hard to describe, but might best be understood by anyone who’s had braces on their teeth. I’m reminded of when my braces would get tightened and I would feel my teeth moving at a glacial pace. I feel the soreness of the floss trying to force a space between my teeth.

Weird Coincidence

In my post last night I mentioned a weird coincidence that I’d not even realized was occurring until I searched for the post I wrote about my broken tooth earlier this year. Honestly, I’d even forgot it happened in January, much less right around the insurrection.

What I realized, and find fascinating, is that I was clenching my teeth so hard at that time in January that I broke off a cracked chunk of tooth and filling in a molar. And believe it or not, there’s an astrological connection.

Don’t roll your eyes. Right now – tomorrow, in fact, at 9:08 a.m. EDT – Mars will be exactly opposite Saturn. Mars is a planet associated with aggressive action, war, forcefulness, willful pushiness, etc. Saturn is associated with structure, foundation, tradition, limitations (teeth/skeleton). Obviously, when Mars is opposing Saturn, there’s a push/pull, clash, confrontation of these two archetypes. Some might describe it as powerful aggression meeting an unmovable object.

Physical/Political

A physical manifestation of when Mars and Saturn meet in challenging aspects such as either an opposition or a square could be an impact such as when one grinds their teeth – to the unhealthy degree that a tooth (Saturn) actually cracks, breaks, or explodes from the unrelenting pressure (Mars). This could happen with either an opposition (when the planets are 180 degrees apart) or a square (when the planets are 90 apart).

A political or outer world manifestation obviously played out most recently in the January 6^th insurrection. Aggressive, unrestrained movement rendered an assault on the bastion of our democracy – the body of our country.

What I find interesting, and didn’t realize until last night, was that my tooth issue in January coincided with the insurrection, and both occurred within a few days of Mars squaring Saturn.

There are other aspects happening within the next few days that are distinctly tied in with last January as well. I’ll write about them later; maybe tomorrow.

In the meantime, I’m making another mouth guard for myself. I think I’m going to need it as events unfold over the next several days. Hopefully I’ll get an appointment with the dentist, too. They were closed today, which was a bummer!

(T-149)

Floss – The Offending Material – Photo: L. Weikel

Floss

Tonight’s post is about frustration. Frustration and irritation and the fact that I cannot think of anything beyond the annoying situation unfolding within my own mouth. Mundane, I know. But man, when stuff happens with your teeth or sinuses – virtually anything above the neck – it’s almost by definition ‘in your face,’ and thus nearly impossible to ignore. The unlikely culprit causing my supreme discomfort this evening? Floss.

You wouldn’t think floss would cause an issue, but it has. Actually, technically, floss hasn’t caused the issue – it is the issue.

This seems to be an issue that probably originated in January, when I clenched my teeth long and hard enough to break off a piece of one of my molars. I wrote a post about it back when it happened because, again, it was ‘in my face’ and I could think of nothing else to write about in the moment.

In doing a quick search for that post so I could provide a link to it, I had a slight ‘aha’ moment. I realized there’s a connection between when I broke my tooth back in January and what I’m experiencing now.

The Issue

Oddly enough, I broke a chunk off one of my molars in January a few days after the insurrection on January 6^th. As I mentioned above, it was caused by clenching my teeth. I was lucky enough to get an appointment with my dentist right away and she was able to fix it without the necessity of heroic efforts.

This actually led to a situation that I only just today (I swear) mentioned to Karl that I’m going to have to make another appointment with the dentist to address. Specifically, no matter what I put into my mouth to eat, ultimately a piece of it finds itself wedged between the tooth that was repaired and the one beside it. And sadly, it seems like the space between the two teeth is getting larger. (Why does it always feel like any gap or space in our mouth – no matter how small – feels like a veritable cavern when probed with our tongue?) A question for another time, I guess.

Until I make another appointment with the dentist, though, I deal with it by religiously ‘packing floss.’ Indeed, yet again tonight, I had to whip out the floss to remove the offending material. Of course, while I was at it, I decided to floss between the rest of the teeth in my head, since the more’s the merrier. Can’t be too fastidious.

Yeah. Right. Nope.

An Imbalance

I believe an imbalance has occurred in my mouth over the past six months since my broken molar (which actually was mostly a broken filling) was repaired. The gap on one side has grown larger while all the teeth on the other side of my mouth have squished together. The way I know this?

Floss.

Tonight, while flossing all of my pearly whites, the floss I was using got stuck between two molars. Indeed – the very same two molars where the annoying gap is located on the other side of my mouth. Now how weird is that (but not)? The two molars on the other side of my mouth are so tightly clenched together, so to speak, that the stupid floss broke off between them. Now, all I can feel is the pressure it’s causing as it sits there, wedged in where it doesn’t belong.

I’ve tried everything to remove it, from trying to coax it out with a thinner type of another floss to trying to use tweezers to pull out the offensive material. No deal. It’s in there for good.

So I guess I really do need to call the dentist tomorrow. How embarrassing and annoying. But at least maybe I’ll restore dental balance.

(T-150)