Open Wide

I had a dental cleaning last week. My teeth are, well, they’re fine, except when they’re not.

I was told at the cleaning that I needed fillings in two bottom teeth. The teeth are next to each other, the cavities were actually touching each other.

I know, gross.

I have a long history with bad teeth. My baby teeth were pretty much rotting out of my head. I blame uninformed parents who put Pepsi in my bottle when I was a baby. Again, GROSS!

My adult teeth aren’t quite that bad but I do confess that from about 16 until my mid-twenties, I did not see a dentist…ever.

When I was thirteen and a dentist told my dad that if he wanted me to be ‘pretty’ he could pay for braces but that would be the only reason to recommend orthodontic care at that point.

Do I need to tell you that my dad did not think I needed to be pretty?

But I digress.

When I started working in Chicago, my job offered excellent dental insurance and so I schlumped into a dentist’s office, all ashamed that I hadn’t had so much as a cleaning in about ten years. (Side note: I miss that excellent dental insurance. I no longer have dental insurance at all. The company for which I work will reimburse any employee who has company sponsored insurance up to $1000 a year for cleanings and work. That’s $1000 for the entire family, by the way. Guess who has already maxed out that little reimbursement plan?)

The dentist in Chicago was lovely. She was so kind and gentle and told me that shame was not necessary, that the last ten years no longer mattered because I was there and ready to get my teeth into shape.

It took some work, let me tell you. Several fillings and a crown later and I was referred to an orthodontist because apparently, orthodontic care is not just cosmetic. My teeth were so screwed up that I wasn’t keeping the backs of my top teeth clean with mere brushing.

Braces fixed that and my bite and here we are. I am proud to say that I haven’t missed a cleaning in all the years since I first started seeing my lovely dentists in Chicago. Yes, I still consider her MY dentist even though I haven’t seen her in almost twenty year.

When you start chemotherapy, they tell you that dry mouth might be a side effect. But they don’t tell you that cavities are a side effect of the dry mouth.

In the seventeen months since I finished chemo, I’ve had to get eight cavities filled.

EIGHT.

The first five, six months ago, were on the backs of three of my top front teeth. Yikes.

So I went in about five days after the cleaning to have those two cavities filled and hey, what do you know? The dentist, who wasn’t at the cleaning (he’d brought in a substitute dentist) last week, had come back and reviewed my x-rays and decided that not only did I need the cavities on the bottom left teeth filled but would you look at that, I needed a filling on a tooth on the top left too.

Whee!!! Let the games begin.

I hate fillings.

Who doesn’t, right?

I’m grown up, though. I can usually get through just about anything unpleasant because I can tell myself that it isn’t going to last forever.

This time, though, after the topical numbing and the shots, the dentist settled in with his drill and nope, I was still feeling that. Could we do something about the sensation of pain? That’d be great.

So he gave me another shot on the bottom and then started in on the top.

I clenched my fists and repeated silently, “It won’t last forever. It can’t last forever.”

I think tears actually trickled out the corners of my eyes.

At one point, the dentist took a little break from the drilling and grinding and pushing in my mouth and I was able to breath for a minute. My heart was racing and I was shaking.

I’ve never had that reaction before. It was awful.

I did get myself under control without having to leave the chair or even sit up but damn.

I feel for those who have panic attacks because this was a terrible feeling.

They finished up and I was released from the chair.

I got back to work about 12:30 and by 3:30, the bottom left of my mouth was still numb. But that Mexican pizza I got from Taco Bell at 12:25 was still delicious when I stuffed it in my numb face at 3:35, just managing to avoid chomping down on the inside of my left cheek.

My next cleaning is in February. Let’s see how many fillings I’ll need then. On the bright side, the $1000 reimbursement plan will have started over by then. Wonder how fast I can go through it in 2020.