I had one tooth removed about 3 days before I was supposed to leave for a month in Italy. Not smart. I woke up at about 3am the morning of the flight unable to swallow and in intense pain. I called Delta customer service and got that lovely automated system "please say your reservation number". Well, swollen like a pissed off puffer fish and unable to open my mostly locked jaws, I had to try to say a number with a lot of letters/numbers that sounded alike (such as P3VCT etc). The voice politely replied "I'm sorry...I didn't understand you. Please say your reservation number again." I did as instructed and was met with the same response. I knew that what I was saying was coming out sounding like "EEEE, EEEEE, MWEEE, TEEEE" but I was trying. After about three tries the voice finally gave up and transferred me to an operator and I was able to postpone the flight.
Before all was done, I ended up having a second wisdom tooth pulled which seems to have helped things out but considering that I had some lockjaw from the first pulling, the second one required that I be out cold. I wasn't going to argue, although when the doc used the term "happy juice" to describe what he was going to give me I probably should have been a bit concerned.
The lockjaw stuck around, but it gradually improved. I will say that spending three weeks straight in Rome was wonderful therapy. Jaws cannot remain locked around all of that amazing food.
I never did figure out what happened and the doc said that everything went smoothly. I don't usually react like that.