Last monday I had upper palette surgery.  They cut loose my upper jaw so they can widen it.  It healed for a week and this monday I started cranking open the expander in the roof of my mouth.  I give it 4 cranks a day for 6 days, with the last four cranks on this coming saturday.  4 cranks is equal to 1 mm per day.  This give me a total of 6mm expansion in the next week.  When I do it, it is the strangest feeling I have ever had...just bizarre.

I thought you were going to say you tried the left hand!  [:P]

I had braces when I was in my late twenties and the feeling you describe sounds like when they used to take needle nose pliers and tighten the wires to pull the teeth together after they created space by pulling four teeth.  It was a very strange sensation.