Treading Water
The Familiar Meets the Unknown
On June 24, Raphe decided
to say hello once again
…in the last fifteen minutes
of my appointment!
Both my osteopath and I were shocked by his appearance.
Raphe (the pterybomandibular raphye) was the topic of an ongoing conversation. And, while putting on her gloves, my osteopath asked me to show her exactly where on my left pterygomandiulbar raphe the ‘sharp’ sensation was located. She palpated both the right and left raphes; returning to the left side, with eyes as big as saucers, she exclaimed: “There’s a tear or indentation in the raphe!”
Conversation centered around BCP Peptide injections in the raphe to strengthen this tendon that was injured. This is my throat. The only other ‘throat’ injection I’ve had was by my oral surgeon in Indiana. The injection precipitated a ‘flash back’ experience of my intubation injury in his dental chair! One minute my mouth was open for the injection….and the next thing I became aware of was holding onto the surgeon’s sleeve behind the dental chair and crying. He said I ‘flew’ out of the chair; I remembered nothing. I was speechless during the appointment remembering this 1998 incident.
This wasn’t the first appointment where a startling discovery or statement has materialized…
at the very end of my last treatment.
Within ten minutes of this discovery, I was leaving to drive from Santa Cruz to the San Jose airport enroute to Phoenix. Her next patient was already in treatment since my appointment was extended. Furthermore, she was leaving for Boston early the next morning.
When I arrived home, I became very proactive. If there was an ‘indentation’ or ‘tear’ in this tendon in the lower part of the raphe, why couldn’t there be a pouch that would collect fluid ….or a sliver of bone? A phone call to my local dentist to release my recent CBCT scan for another month and an email to my San Jose dentist asking for a ‘penetrating’ look at this area of my scan for any abnormalities.
This area is the location in the vicinity of the lower end of the Raphe.
And two days later, I find myself sending yet another email with a a pathology report from a 1998 debridement by my oral surgeon. A specimen literally ‘popped’ out of my mouth six weeks post op. This ‘calcified tonsillar debris’ created a loud ‘snapping’ sound as I bent over a filing cabinet…and out popped this sizeable piece of calcification. An instantaneous shocking thought raced through my mind creating horror: “This broke off – a piece is still in my throat. No one will ever find it.”
Is this in fact the reality? This awareness precipitated a phone call to my local dentist who did the recent CBCT scan. We have an appointment in a week to discuss this scan. I hope to get a second read by a dental radiologist and these two ‘oral incidents’ of the past.
Memories of the late 90’s and my oral surgeon’s dental chair experience keep creeping into my awareness.
What secrets does Raphe hold?
I again walk deeper into the Unknown.
Ten days later I’m sitting with my Phoenix dentist relating my Raphe story as he pulls up my recent April scan. Unfortunately, a CBCT scan is not the appropriate scan to study Raphe. For whatever reason, I asked him to look in the Eustachian tube area based on back-and-forth conversations with my Santa Cruz osteopath about this area as a potential source of my symptoms. This unplanned conversation produced a large surprise.
Zooming into this area, the dentist exclaimed,
“Look at this!”.
The big-screen TV displaying the CBCT scan is
definitely ‘in-your-face’. It was very easy to see what the dentist was referring to in my Eustachian tube as he manipulated the scan forwards and backwards.
“What is it?” I exclaimed as I peered at the ‘thing’
that was hanging into an opening.
“Looks like a calcification,” was his shocking statement.
After twenty-nine years of saying there was something in the tissue, I was so stunned that I couldn’t even continue a conversation with him before he left for his next patient.
Too much information – between a potential throat injection
in the Raphe and now wondering and waiting to see if this dentist actually identified a calcification?!
My proactivity after this appointment has resulted in requesting a second read of this 2025 CBCT scan by the same dental radiologist who my dentist recently engaged to investigate
my 2024 CBCT scan to confirm or deny the former fistulae (hole) in the maxillary sinus floor he had discovered in 2002.
What happened to Raphe?
He didn’t come with me to the dentist;
thus I’ve invited him to visit my ENT!
I will be visiting my ENT with all of this information six days before I leave for Santa Cruz, asking him for a second read of my 2024 MRI to investigate Raphe as well as get his impression of the Eustachian tube discovery. My ENT has already started the process of radiology review and is aware of what has recently happened…
thanks to communication via the office portal.
Apparently, you have to know exactly where to look and what you’re looking for!
Precision – just a little up on the pterygomandibular raphe from its insertion in the retromolar trigone area.
All of this before I return to Santa Cruz in ten days!
I am most grateful for the cooperation of these various physicians in two different worlds of medical perspectives
as they help me piece together my lifetime puzzle.
Cooperation with differences do exist, even in this day and age of extremes.
Where is all of this ‘revelation’ going?
Raphe says Hello
to my ENT!
I took my laptop to my ENT appointment to show the CBCT scan. That was quite an experience in technology.
I finally met with success connecting into their network with the help of a nurse
and was able to access the scan on the cloud.
My ENT took one look, moved around the axial view a bit and stated while he proceeded to look in my ear:
“That’s not your Eustachian tube…that’s your ear canal.
And most likely a piece of ear wax was present at the time of the scan.”
Well, so much for a dentist reading a scan of the ear!
I’m certainly glad that I am having this reviewed by a radiologist.
And I will be most curious to see what my San Jose dentist says about this “thing”.
On another note, I relayed the information that my Osteopath had discovered on the raphe.
He then palpated both sides of the raphe. And, Raphe says hello: “I do feel a nodule,”
he said as he poked around eliciting pain. He was willing to order another scan.
This was a first for him – feeling this ‘whatever’.
And he was quick to say that he didn’t know what it was or what he could do.
I am waiting to see what happens at this next visit in California next week
before having another MRI or Raphe injected with BPC peptides
California HAPPENINGS
Dental Appliance, Ears, NightLase and Airplane
Santa Cruz and San Jose are always full of surprises.
This ‘End-of-‘July’ trip ended up having four unexpected “happenings.”
These events propelled me into another level as seen below.
The Happenings encounters are recounted in August.
Hope and Fear
Thus, unannounced,
my ‘door ajar’ (hope) was once again
flung wide open from this unexpected comment by my dentist when he opened the CBCT scan and two weeks later in the aftermath of my airplane adventure returning home.
‘To let go is to lose your foothold temporarily.
Not to let go is to lose your foothold forever.
Soren Kierkegaard
Spiritual Awakening
I was powerless
as my door ajar was swiftly transformed into a limitless, infinite boundless space,
catapulting me into simultaneous overwhelming sensations, emotions
and memories. These two events so close in proximity – what is the lesson?
By combining the words of hope and fear, Pema Chodron transports
me to an expanded realm of understanding which gives birth to COURAGE.
“REDOK: A feeling with two sides…as long as there’s one there’s the other.”
(When Things Fall Apart, p. 39)
If hope and fear are two sides of one coin,
so are Hopelessness and Confidence.
If we’re willing to give up hope that insecurity and pain can be exterminated,
then we can have the Courage to relax
with the Groundlessness of our situation.
Hopelessness is the basic ground.’”
(When Things Fall Apart, p. 41)
I juggle Pema Chodron’s words, preferring the word Groundlessness to Hopelessness (the basic ground).
Is Groundlessness, therefore, the same as Surrender…
Where both Trust and Confidence are born and can reside in the Ground of Being with the Boundless Presence….
Where the vital force, the energy of life, vibrates… expanding and contracting as does our Breath?
And can we touch this ‘vital force’?
Impermanence once again is foremost in my spirit
in the days following my Phoenix return.
Transformational language arises from our need to express that which is Beyond Words.
Music also transports me Beyond Words
….the sound of the Soul speaking
as I wander and wonder and wait.
Sound and Vibration
I recently purchased a Tibetian Singing Bowl over 200 years old.
The resonance of the vibration ‘shimmers‘ the sharp pain in my throat and jaw much like the laser light.
Midnight Blue has a deep bass line that vibrates with incredible resonance when listening with high-quality speakers. My car has my best speaker system; I will sit and listen when parking in my carport. I can feel this vibration “shimmer” through my jaw and left side of head. The tears the sound generates speak to my soul as well as my discomfort. In this way, I ‘welcome’ my pain with the path of least resistance. This not dissipate the pain, but it allows me more tolerance. The sensation is beyond belief. Just wish my iPhone and computer had better speakers!
I continue to wander and wonder as I wait
with listening ears and music resonating within,
carrying me deep into my Soul.
And I tell my story with sound…
…wandering
on stepping stones
deeper into
The Unknown –
and wondering
“Where am I going?”
So many Years….
and living
somewhere in between
the Known and the
Unknown….
What is the
Potential of the Body
for restoration and
healing?
Tolerate Ambiguity…
Dwell in
Potentiality