Fun At The Dentist

I finally got in to see the dentist today. I was having sensitivity to pressure and cold on the left side of my mouth, both upper and lower.

I have hated going to the dentist since I was a child. Our family dentist was a sadist and it never fully came together for me until I had seen Little Shop of Horrors. Only I wasn't begging for more. I remember the diagnosis of 12 cavities on one visit and fillings were usually performed without novacaine.

The pain would be so bad that I would pinch the tops of my thighs as hard as I could and then focus in my mind on that pain to distract myself from the excruciating pain in my mouth. Thanks to him, I have a mouth full of amalgam and I wonder if there ever were any real cavities.

One time the pain was so bad that the tears were rolling down my cheeks. The doctor's response? "Stop crying you baby." Nice. I was around eight years old and there wasn't much I could do. Complaints to my parents were met with, "He never uses novacaine with me and I never feel a thing." The question wasn't whether they had pain, it was that I had pain and they needed to do something about it. And so it went until I was 16 and declared I was never going back. I hold this type of thing against my parents as an example of how they never protected me so when I really needed them later on I suffered in silence.

The first visit to any new dentist is the time I establish that I will not, under any circumstances, stay unless there is a "no pain" guarantee. I've been lucky since that time and I was actually looking forward to today's visit.

Y'all know I've been feeling crappy but something happened today that made me think of Tater and Tony who enjoyed my wisecracks when we did blogger weekend back in November. I had been feeling like shit but forced myself to go to the museum with the group so I could at least meet them and participate on some level. After nearly fainting at the museum, I caught a second wind and was like my old, non-sick self — funny and full of wisecracks. That lasted until we stopped at a cafe a bit later where I crashed again and ended up sleeping for 16 hours immediately upon return to the hotel.

So today was much the same. After feeling crappy for so long, all of a sudden I was Mr. Funny by the time I sat down in the dentist chair.

It all started when the dental assistant gave me the thinner "half" of a tongue depressor to bite down on to see if I could more accurately describe where I was having the pain. The dentist came in a bit later, and looking at the depressor in my hand, asked if he could have my small piece. "I beg your pardon," I said with a chuckle. It took a second for it to sink in to the dentist and the assistant. I was the only one who laughed but I ended up getting them all on board the more I sat there and the more things struck me funny.

The doc filled a cavity on my upper left molar and had to inject novacaine in my outer cheek twice and once on the inside gum to finally get things where I didn't feel anything. Honestly, he drilled and drilled for what seemed like 15 minutes and there was burning smoke wafting from my mouth. I asked him, "Geez, are you looking for oil up there? I know it's $100 a barrel but this is a little ridiculous." He told me he'd split it with me if he found anything. "You're gonna end up drilling to China if you keep it up at this rate."

After the drilling, he was explaining to the assistant what he'd done before he put in the filling. As she leaned in to examine the excavation, I warned her, "Don't fall in!"

Next was the lower tooth. The dentist determined that there is likely a crack under a filling. He ground it down a bit so the area doesn't make contact on my bite. When the tooth isn't having that trauma, the nerve won't be irritated anymore and the sensitivity to cold will go away. If it doesn't, he'll have to remove the existing filling and cap it.

Talking about the cracked tooth, I exclaimed, "A dry crack is a happy crack!" There is a local company here that does basement repair and they run tv ads with that tagline. The double entendre hits you over the head like a sledgehammer with its lack of subtlety. Every time I see the ad, I always reply to the tagline, "Truer words were never spoken." I'm going to look for the ad on YouTube for this Saturday's levity post.

In the end, he, the assistant, and I had a grand time. Before you ask: No, there was no gas involved.
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