Your son has my greatest sympathy, forgive me for second guessing the feelings of your son, who you obviously know better, but those abscesses MUST be causing him pain, I think it more likely he is feeling pain, but not communicating it.
I had an abscess in my jaw once, they **** KILL, it happened because I ended up headbutting a guy in a football game as a kid (not intentionally), half of my tooth ended up in the guys head, the other half stayed in me, and it got infected.
I have never felt the same degree of pain before in my life, and hopefully never will again, you gotta get them sorted out as soon as possible, as its possible for the infection to spread if untreated and destroy the jawbone.
I have a nasty toothache right now, so I really do empathise with your son.
Its nasty, infections tend to do that, I woke up yesterday morning with my jaw feeling like it just met a set of brass knucks head on, the line between not hurting, and hurting like buggery seems to be very fine.
Haha so do I
I got kicked off my dentists list when he went private only, and I haven't the money to afford private treatment, so for now its a bottle of cheap vodka, what skag i have left and a dr appointment which means waking at 8.30am, yuck, I am so much the night owl I think I'l just stay awake all night.
Chances of me waking up tomorrow morning? slim to *** all.
Lestat doesn't do mornings.
Oh I stand by my not doing mornings, I was up all night, so technically, didn't wake up in the morning, not having woken up at all, merely sobered up slowly, I can stand, walk about even, the eyes are open, but right now it feels like the ol' grey matter is still taking a nap
Got an early dr appointment, got to get what my last dr said was restless leg syndrome sorted, and maybe, just maybe, worm my way into trying out piracetam on the NHS.
It is interesting about the eye area pain - I know that sometimes if a person has pain in different areas of their body, the most significant pain can override the other pains - so the person doesn't notice them as much, or even at all.
Also, some people are just hyposensitive to pain, or have sensitivities to some pain but not to others which can lead to uneven responses or disproportionate responses to pain.
It is probably worth monitoring this in order to avoid a situation where something serious occurs but your son has no pain to indicate this - but it sounds like you are already doing this.
Regarding the risk of infection - are there any prescription mouthwashes that can help? I used one when I had problems with my wisdom teeth in order to prevent infection but that one was not suitable for children. (it also caused staining of my teeth, a common side effect, but my dentist was able to clean the stains off easily).
*warning - do not read if you retch in sympathy with others!*
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I have odd reactions to pain. Either oversensitive or under. Currently I have one half of a left tooth missing and a rather large dint in a back one. I'm scared of the dentist and I keep thinking that if they gas me or inject me I'm gonna die, so I've had intermittant pain for the last year and a half. It's there now. I clean with an interseminal toothbrush and stick sensodyne on it. When it's really bad I take pain killers. I know I should get it sorted out but I'm really scared of going to the dentist. They bang around in my mouth and then get all indignant when I'm retching. I'm always working not to retch when I clean my teeth in the morning.
Oh Alectrum,
Sometimes you are so like my husband. Have you tried cloves yet to ease the pain?
He does go to the dentist now. But that's a dentist who has special talents adressing scared patients.
My dad pulled lot's of teeth himself, not wanting the sedative. Not afraid of the pain but really scared of the sedation.
I'm afraid of sedation too.
My dad too. I've got cloves. I'll try them. 
*warning - do not read if you retch in sympathy with others!*
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*warning - I mean it!*
I have odd reactions to pain. Either oversensitive or under. Currently I have one half of a left tooth missing and a rather large dint in a back one. I'm scared of the dentist and I keep thinking that if they gas me or inject me I'm gonna die, so I've had intermittant pain for the last year and a half. It's there now. I clean with an interseminal toothbrush and stick sensodyne on it. When it's really bad I take pain killers. I know I should get it sorted out but I'm really scared of going to the dentist. They bang around in my mouth and then get all indignant when I'm retching. I'm always working not to retch when I clean my teeth in the morning.
Yee ouch! Nasty one, but no easy solution to that kind of problem. Have you tried asking for recommendations for a dentist who's really good with people who're terrified? Some dentists use hypnotism instead of gas or injections - do you think that would be helpful at all?
I'm really impressed with our dentist, because he's taking things as slowly as he can, not just in dealing with this current problem, but because he doesn't want my son to have a negative experience which will affect him in the future.
Today, he decided pretty quickly that it wasn't going to work, so although it was pretty traumatic at the time, it wasn't long drawn out.
I'm in Spain, and not too clever with the language yet. I'd like to use hypnotism and I think I'm probably highly suggestible but because I know about the dynamics of hypnotism and have certain barriers of my own put up against outside suggestion (years of meditation and magick), then I don't think it would work.
I definately need a dentist like yours that understands when enough is enough.
I just stuck cloves into the holes in my teeth, and I have to say - stim!
Maybe I should go get treatment when I visit the UK, but I have bad dreams about that too. All about dying, and getting my insides messed with and transferred to a hospital. I'm not afraid of dying, but it's just going along with a presentiment would be - well, messed up, and maybe a matter of suggestion, and that... well, the power of self suggestion is very real. That's why I'm afraid.
Yeah Shnoing, - I don't exactly advertise this to my hubby because I don't want to go, but... I need to and I keep it to myself mostly and he doesn't recognise it because I'm not yelling at him or making a big deal.
Last week I had a wisdom tooth extracted and the dentist said there was an abscess at the root of the tooth. Last year, it was quite sore for a few days and I had to take a few painkillers and chew some cloves but then the pain went away. The gums around the tooth were quite uncomfortable for a week or so before I went to the dentist but at no time was I in agonising pain. That's why I was quite surprised when the dentist said there was an abscess.
The hole where the tooth was is healing fast and I'm very relieved it is out. I would like the bottom one taken out too because it is too hard to keep clean but it isn't in as bad condition as the top one was. It must have died last year.
Gas really isn't too bad, nitrous oxide is what they usually use, I've had that done as a kid, I had a few funny looks after I asked the nurse doing it for a specific N2O/O2 balance though....
It doesn't knock you out cold, and doesn't have the cardiac risks of conventional inhaled general anaesthetics like sevofluorane, desfluorane or the like, it acts as dissociative, more like ketamine but a lot milder, and actually feels pretty good.
Not something to worry about
I HATE injections though, especially the post-treatment feeling like your lips have become the size of rubber tyres hanging off your face, thats just nasty.
A big thing with me is to see a dentist that speaks my primary language because I'm scared enough. I know it's daft...
I'm going to visit the dental hospital when I go back to England.