5 Things Nobody Tells You About Getting Punched in the Face

5 You May Not Just Shake It Off and Walk Away

How much damage could a little fat kid do? Turns out plenty. Since I didn't get knocked out, I assumed I'd just spring back like Adam Sandler after his Bob Barker beating. And if there was some swelling, well, perhaps I'd tease the local raccoons with a raw sirloin comically draped across my mouth. Because I'm a jerk to woodland creatures that way.

A quick check in the bathroom mirror disabused me of the notion that I was going to be Happy Gilmore. It looked like Predator had stopped over at my place to take a whiz. My lower jaw was hanging in two different directions and most of my lower teeth looked like they were gone.

This was not a waggle-daggle your head and get back to regular business scenario. This was 911 stuff. I no longer had a phone, so the nice lady next door won the blood-spitting-smashed-face-neighbor surprise doorbell lottery.

After 18 hours in the ER, I got good news -- all my teeth were intact (well, for now -- more about that later) -- and bad news -- my lower jaw and left cheek were "interestingly" fractured. My mouth was going to be wired shut. FOR 10 WEEKS.

As it turns out, I was pretty fortunate I didn't get killed. All the ridiculous "knock-out game" hysteria aside, one solid punch can easily be fatal.

While not common, a mandibular fracture (fancy talk for broken jaw that makes you sound like a violated insect) can lead to a lacerated facial artery. "The whole inside of your mouth and throat would have filled with blood," my oral surgeon creep-cheerfully informed me. But normally when people do die after getting socked in the jaw, it's because they're standing up, then take a spill and crack their skull open on something. Same goes for being walloped in the nose (despite the myths, you're not in danger of having bone shards lodged in your brain from a nose punch). So, for once, sitting on my ass did me a solid.

4 There Are Real Dangers to Having Your Jaw Wired

There are no real hi-tech alternatives to having your jaw wired shut. It's a multi-hour process that involves what looks like an American Horror Story tool kit and coils of industrial metal that are wound through your teeth and twisted off at the ends like barbed wire.

Hospitals don't tend to carry "So We Just Sealed Up Your Mouth Like Some Kind of Goddamn Horror Movie. Now What?" pamphlets. In fact, they don't really give you any information at all on how to go on being a living human being. Luckily (at least for me, not for them) I have a few friends who have had their jaws wired up for significant spells, so I was given some advice.

Your mouth will taste like corpse, because all the blood that gushed about after you got punched in the face is still tucked into the crevices, just stinking it up in there under a thick layer of plaque build-up. And in the midst of that cauldron of gross, you're crammed full of barbed wire that is constantly slicing open the insides of your cheeks. You can't really brush your teeth, so the best chance you have at not developing scores of new cavities and nasty infections (which could even lead to having parts of your jaw removed!) is to blast a Waterpik filled with the strongest mouthwash you can tolerate, then cram tons of orthodontic wax in there.

What if you start to choke or puke? Good question! You will need to get those wires off in a hurry, so you will not die in a manner your family will be reluctant to print in an obituary. A small, sharp pair of jewelry wire-cutting scissors should remain on you at all times like a talisman.

And while not technically dangerous, there's one last thing you don't expect. A complex set of muscles in your upper jaw do not get used at all when your mouth is wired. These muscles will take this opportunity to become lazy and useless. The atrophy will cause your face to slide down your bones till you begin to resemble some kind of jowly Dick Tracy villain.

3 You Will Want to Punch Soup in the Figurative Face

There are sadder words than "all liquid diet" -- like, "everyone you love was mauled by bears" -- but not when contemplating what you'll be sucking through straws for two and a half months. "Liquid" doesn't exactly have a broad spectrum, either.

During my first week I kept staring at a Shepherd's pie in my freezer because I WAS SO FUCKING HUNGRY. Then I thought, "Screw it." I was going to figure out a way to eat it. I heated the pie up and pureed it with a whole bunch of broth. It looked like a pile of dog vomit, but I had never wanted to eat something so badly in my life. Well ... too bad. No matter how hard I tried, the goo just mucked up on the front of that tooth fortress like sewer sludge. I worked on it for two hours before broken-heartedly tossing it in the garbage and then setting the entire world on fire in my mind.

Sadly, the only things that are going to keep you alive are: gross-ass nutrition drinks, protein powder, fancy juices, and pureed soups. A blender stick will be your goddamn frenemy.

Everyone says, "Oh, but at least you'll lose weight!" And you do. But not nearly what you'd imagine and/or hope. After not seeing me for two months, many of my friends thought I'd be some kind of walking skeleton. But I just looked like I'd maybe had the flu for a week. Why? BECAUSE I WAS ALWAYS FUCKING HUNGRY. You can easily be sucking down 3,000 calories a day while not otherwise physically moving your body because you're too exhausted from various vitamin and mineral deficiencies. And it's not like you're ever going to say to yourself, "Well, maybe I shouldn't have that seventh bowl of soup ..."

Don't think you're going to go on any steakhouse gluttony tour right after you get that metal mess out of your mouth, either. Those lazy muscles that made you look like Lip Manlis? They also won't let you chew actual food for at least two or three weeks after you regain mouth freedom. Chunks of $70 porterhouse would just tumble back onto your plate, saliva-damp and unmasticated.

2 Your Teeth Might Still Die

Surprise! When you get punched in the face hard enough you can never, ever move on! After any kind of facial trauma, the teeth around the fractured bone will be forever in danger of pulp necrosis, which basically means they all might just up and die. Could manifest tomorrow, could be 15 years down the line when you suddenly have a maw full of blackened, hillbilly tooth stumps.

You must diligently keep going to the dentist and have those areas monitored. If caught early, it'll be a root canal. But even then you still might wind up with extractions and faux chompers. Don't want zombie mouth? Then no more dodging those Garfield check-up reminder cards you get in the mail every six months.

Frankly, I don't think my lower teeth are going to make it in the long term. They don't feel right. They feel weak. Like they could give up and bring down my whole operation.

Did I mention I will throw that fat kid in front of a bus if I ever see him again?

1 Wear a Damn Watch

Don't be stupid like me and use your phone as a time-telling device. Get a watch. This whole thing was a common street ruse, which Lifehacker tried to warn me and the rest of the world's dummies about years ago.

Griffin Newman (aka America's favorite coffee-spilling intern in Draft Day) was recently asked the time by a shifty stranger. When he checked his wrist, Mr. Shifty claimed he didn't trust watches and insisted Griffin consult a phone for the digitally correct hour of day. No-dummy-Griffin didn't take the bait. Sure, he was called a "watch-wearing faggot," but he was not punched in the face.

Of course, if you really want to get punched extra hard, preorder an iWatch.

For more from Anita, check out 5 Common Nightmares We All Have. And then check out The 17 Most Unintentionally Hilarious Movie Fight Scenes.

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