Most of my readers can relate to seminal moments in their life. Certain times, good or bad, that served as a basic rite of passage and can be neither repeated nor forgotten. I had one of these moments recently.

I had my wisdom teeth removed.

While I (and most people) have four, I was only half as lucky as my older sister who only had to get her uppers removed because there were no others. The dentist sort of shrugged in her case suggesting, “maybe [her] luckiness was genetic?” I apparently didn’t receive her genetic lottery ticket. Of course, there are the chosen few that have none as well as some in this audience that may have had eight, or even more.

This whole process began well enough with one of those regular cleanings and an x-ray set after which a benign enough looking sheet of paper traded hands and a short discussion that could be summarized as “it really was time to have Ruth’s wisdom teeth removed.”

The timing was set for the Monday of my Spring Break to allow me to lick my wounds and recover for the maximum amount of time possible without taking away from summer. Unlike some procedures that allow for various creature comforts before the procedure, I was given strict instructions of no food or water prior. I slept in.

I remember little of the procedure itself as it was the first time I received general anesthesia. My recovery, like the one you may remember, had its fits and starts. I came around on the drive home and couldn’t really talk which probably pleased most of my family.

Really, the first few days of my recovery weren’t half bad. I got to eat applesauce which was okay for a while. It wasn’t until the third or fourth day that I needed to take the fancy painkiller my doctor prescribed — a small but highly effective pill that started with the letter “O”. And by day five, I started to get better enough that most of what I would have described as trauma started to become a good story in my mind.

Looking on the bright side, I managed to complete my largest paper of the semester during that time. While I’ll never know the extent of discomfort I would have faced if I hadn’t had my wisdom teeth removed, I’ll trust the saying that “every cloud has a silver lining.” They always do.

Ruth Wiseman is a Woodland Park native and a dual-enrolled high school student attending Pikes Peak State College

Hershey’s candy bars Take 5, PayDay, Almond Joy and a York Peppermint Patty are all popular, but only one is on author Ruth Wiseman’s “personal favorites” list. (SARINYAPINNGAM

via getty images)