My day at the dentist
Actually, it started over a month ago when I was out west and broke a tooth. Split it longitudinally down the middle between front half and back half, with the back half disappearing and leaving the front part looking quite normal. It’s something I’d never done before and which still puzzles me. I wasn’t even chomping on anything all that challenging.
Today was the day for the temporary crown. After I put my shoes on while getting ready to go out, one of my socks felt like it needed a bit of pulling up. So I slipped out of the shoe – they’re very easy-on, easy-off – and saw to my horror a large bug crawling out of the shoe, over the top and down, and then towards a crack in the wall where it mercifully disappeared. Will I now have to look inside my shoes with a flashlight every time I put them on? Did I mention this was a very large and revolting bug, one of those scuties I wrote about long ago?
I decided to assume it would tell it’s scutie friends beyond the wall to beware of getting into those black boats belonging to the weird creature on the other side. They may look cozy and comfy at first, but you run the risk of suddenly getting crushed.
My dentist is new and rather young. He bought the practice of my old dentist who was, well, old. I had a crush of sorts on the old dentist, who “got” my humor and used to joke back, and who was actually very attractive despite his advanced age (married, alas). This new dentist seems competent and kind, but I’d never had work done by him and this was apparently a challenging job.
So I was nervous.
I was there for three hours. I’m not a dental-phobic, but there’s always some tension and this was a bit more grueling than usual, with more drilling and other involved machinations. They had all these new-fangled gadgets – for example some sort of scanner probe that takes a topographic portrait of your entire mouth that ends up looking like a white mountain range with pink foothills. This is supposed to replace old-fashioned impressions (which I never found to be a problem) and lead to a better-fitting crown. And so I suppose it did, although the first crown wouldn’t fit and they had to make a second.
I found afterwards that I felt very tired. I think it’s because even if you are trying to relax and think you’re doing a pretty good job, there’s a low-level constant stress that leads to tensing of various muscles for a long time even if you’re unaware of doing that. Dentistry is an exercise in trust; you’re in the hands of two strangers poking around inside your mouth and inflicting discomfort at times or even pain, and you’re captive in that chair and will be paying a great deal for the privilege.
However, all’s well that ends well.
Nice post. I had a very similar experience about 5 or 6 weeks ago at my dentist. The new guy had taken over the practice a few years ago from a good friend of mine. In my case, I had a low level respiratory infection, which didn’t interfere, but I wasn’t feeling exactly tip-top even at the start. It went very well, but 2.5 hours later I was exhausted.
A couple of years ago a dentist was looking at the X-ray of my root canal, which was done when I was ten years old, and he was impressed to learn that the silver plug is considerably older than he is.
Shoes: I’ve got most of my shoes on shelves in plastic boxes. I was raised in the desert southwest, and still have the habit of knocking unboxed shoes together to make sure no bugs are in them before putting my feet in. I haven’t found any scorpions, but I still habitually check.
Neo, you are now subject to the Old Age Disease. As we get older, so do those that take care of us, like Dentists, Doctors, Lawer’s (no won’t go there), Auto Mechanics,
Insurance Agents. We get new, younger ones, ones we have not built up a trust in. And the Young Ones don’t know you either. And of course they all look like they should be in Junior High
Oh, Neo, I feel for you! The last time that I had the traditional method of getting a crown–the big horseshoe full of goop–I had a panic attack. Ever since then I’ve gone to a local chain dentistry that has that lovely scanner! Much easier! But I know just what you mean about that anxious feeling in the dental chair. I’m glad that you were able to get that tooth fixed!
Neo: I’m sorry for your troubles. A cracked tooth is a whole new dimension of suffering. When I think of it, I marvel and shudder at what our ancestors went through (before good dentistry): you broke a tooth, it got infected, you died in great pain.
I find myself tensing badly when I’m in the chair, and have to remind myself to relax. When I get to the counter to pay, I tense again…
My dentist also started by taking over from my previous dentist, and he is quite good, better than the original. He also implemented a more modern practice.
My fitness tracker says otherwise, which was a surprise. I make an effort to relax and sometimes almost doze off.
My wife and I used to laugh about her mother referring to people 35 or older, adults in positions of responsibility, as “little”—as in “that little boy who runs the auto repair place” or “the little girl who works in the doctor’s office.” Now we do it, too.
Not long ago I had that experience of having a piece of tooth just break off on a very slim pretext. No pain, fortunately, but disconcerting.
I figured out that dentist office tension-fatigue thing a while back. Sometimes had problems with it when I had to go straight from there to work. One of those things where understanding what was happening made it easier to manage.
Neo,
I feel your pain and DEEPLY sympathize!
I actually have great teeth with very few cavities or other issues over the course of my life. When something does crop up, like a small crack, the ‘best case’, instead of the ‘worst case’ scenario usually happens.
BUT! When I was seven, I broke my front teeth out racing bikes with my brother. As a result, I’ve had my front teeth capped 4 times over the years.
Torture. No other word for it. TORTURE.
And yes, the stress of it is exhausting.
Funny ‘Only In Hawaii’ story. I had the last set of caps temporaries on and one fell off. Of course on a Sunday morning. I call my dentist and – miracle – he answered his phone! Told me to meet him at the office in 15 minutes. Got there and he was opening the office door. In tee shirt, wet swim trunks, slippah and sand up to his knees! Doctor O–, I said; So sorry to bother you like this.’ ‘No problem,’ he says; ‘I was right down the street, body surfing Haleiwa Beach Park.’
He didn’t even change. Just slipped on a mask and gloves and glued the cap back on.
God I love country life!
And he did the best caps I ever had, get compliments all the time.
Hope this doesn’t jinx me into a root canal.
Kate,
Same here. Always check the shoes. Centipedes though, not scorpions.
Not that I wear closed toe shoes that often. Garden boots are more like it.
I remember the first time I went to a doctor that was younger than me. He called me by my first name. I called him by his first name. After that, our conversations were “Ms. So-and-so” and “Dr. Whozits.” Our actual last names being substituted with “So-and-so” and “Whozits.”
He never called me by my first name after that.
Sorry to hear about the dental diversions, they are never fun. I hope you’ve found a good one.
Living in the South, you learn early to always tip your boots over and smack the heel, before putting them on. I’ve only knocked out a scorpion once, but I’ve never been stung that way. I was however once stung by a scorpion hiding in my bath towel. That was……an unpleasant shock at a vulnerable moment, needless to say.
When we built our new home, we saw a lot of scorpions the first couple of years. I couldn’t figure it out, until I started asking around the construction folk. It turns out, the bricks are full of them, when they’re delivered on pallets. Most of the brick manufacturing kilns are in West Texas.
When I have a dental procedure I wear my bluetooth-enabled eyemask and play music off my phone. When it’s something beyond a simple cleaning/exam I add 0.5 mg Alprazolam.
Aggie wrote:
“It turns out, the bricks are full of them, when they’re delivered on pallets. Most of the brick manufacturing kilns are in West Texas.”
WOW, that explains a lot!
I live in far southwest Austin …
Brick house. Several scorpion meetups!
Luckily, I’ve avoided being stung.
Our dentist is the third in succession, beginning with the old guy who did all his own cleaning work in later days because he got tired of dealing with the hygienists; he just limited his practice to the number of people he could treat in a day.
We got along well, usually talked politics as he was a deep-dyed conservative, which was nice since he had all the weapons. As Reagan, after he was shot, said in the ER to the doctors, “I hope you’re all Republicans.”
He retired and passed us on to another dentist in the same building, so not much change, although Doc Two did have hygienists. The view from the chair was of the opposite side of the building. He retired a few years later and a younger doc bought the practice. Very competent, and kept a lot of the prior staff, so again not much change, not even the view.
In 2022, one of my upper teeth suddenly just came loose — like Neo, no real reason. Turned out the root canals and crowns had just worn out. He prepped me for an implant and I will note that the bone grafts are NOT fun. I finally got the implant “anchor” last spring and, after the delay from being gone over the summer, should have the tooth itself by the end of the month.
At least I will no longer look like a refugee from “Li’l Abner.”
To echo Aggie, there are certain parts of the world where you must ensure your shoes are empty before you put your feet in them.
Erronius
Day at the braces?
And…watch out for those scorpions, most certainly…but beware of Mme. Karma Chameleon.
“…Black Harvard Professor Demoted Under Claudine Gay Responds to Gay’s Resignation”—
https://freebeacon.com/latest-news/karma-black-harvard-professor-demoted-under-claudine-gay-responds-to-gays-resignation/
Put another way, how does one say “schadenfreude” in Ebonics?
Teeth. We never bother to really think about them until they do something to remind us they are there–like crack or fall out. Then, they demand all our attention until repairs are made. A lot like our government. If only we could manage a federal-level extraction and root canal.
“ Dentistry is an exercise in trust; you’re in the hands of two strangers poking around inside your mouth”
And the dentist must trust you not to bite off a finger. 😉
Neo, be glad your dentist was not like this dentist in MN who is being sued for performing 4 root canals, 8 crowns, and 21 fillings, in one sitting, on a woman.
https://nypost.com/2023/12/26/news/minnesota-woman-sues-dentist-who-left-her-disfigured-and-distressed-after-just-one-visit/
In basic training got the duty to sweep the hallway of our barracks in Texas, which had a huge ventilation fan at the end of it, and as I was sweeping up the dust, the fan was pulling the dust toward it, except for a little bit of sand colored dust, moving in the opposite direction.
Turned out to be a little scorpion.
Talked about this later, and was told that this “baby “scorpion was, in fact, a full sized one around there, whose bite could put you in the hospital.
Shook my shoes out from then on.
Last summer, I picked up one of my shoes in the front hallway and found an ENORMOUS spider on the bottom of it – though not in it! – which caused me to drop the shoe and jump back. Living in the northeast I don’t have the ingrained ‘check your shoes for scorpions’ instinct that our friends in the southwest develop, but…yeah, I check my shoes for bugs now too.
So plenty of sympathy for those unenthusiastic about big bugs in their footwear!
Sorry to hear about your cracked tooth, Neo. Glad to hear it got fixed. If you’re having dental pain, you might want to keep some oil of cloves in your spice cupboard, along with dried cloves. I had an infected wisdom tooth once; nothing seemed to knock out the pain until I put a dried clove on the tooth and bit down. Instant relief! Doesn’t work for everyone, but it worked for me.
Get well soon!