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Thursday, December 31, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Dental Damn
The boys are at swim class so thought I'd catch up a bit in here. It is, of course, a busy time of year, and at the same time, the time of year that I most want to snuggle into bed and sleep and eat cases of clementines. Okay, what I really want to eat is pizza, but since I can't, I'll settle for those sweet temptress tiny oranges.
Speaking of sweet, despite the fact that I've rarely ingested sugar in the last seven and a half years, (not counting those vanilla soy latte days) I somehow ended up with a mouth full of cavities. It may have been that I didn't go to the dentist for about nine years. How does that happen, you might wonder? Well, it starts by just a bit of procrastination. I'll go next month. And then that next month comes and goes. After a few years of this, it becomes a matter of not wanting to go because I'm embarrased that it's been so long since I've gone. The old "gotta clean up the house before the housekeeper gets here" mentality. Then when I finally went, about a year and a half ago, I had a negative experience with the practice I chose. They tried to get me to buy some fancy schmancy vibrating (!) toothbrush, told me I needed a mouthguard at night (!) and other such silliness. I really was going to get the cavities taken care of at another practice, but then I ended up With Child and the only thing I could tolerate having in my mouth for months was cinnamon toothpaste (and tater tots).
So I finally went back and am getting the seven, yes, seven cavities taken care of. Yesterday was round one. Of course, as fate would have it, the only dentist covered on our otherwise fabulous health coverage is the yucky place I went before. However, I'm far too cheap to just pay out of pocket for dental work, so I sucked it up (so to speak) and went back for another exam. It was actually not so bad. My favorite part being that all the chairs have TVs on them! Since Max was at my parents playing his little heart out, I actually considered asking if I could stick around and just watch TV and maybe take a little nap.
Yesterday I went back for the first chunk of work on my teeth-- I was surprisingly anxious. Or maybe not surprisingly. Does anybody really like to go to the dentist? Besides my dad? It's so awkward-- strange people with gloves spelunking in your mouth. (Okay that sounded way naughtier than I'd planned it to. But I'm leaving it there anyways.) I like having the TV at the dentist because it gives your eyes a place to focus-- perhaps that's my biggest qualm about having people work on your teeth-- they're staring at your face, but at no cost should you try and make eye contact with them. I tried closing my eyes but that felt wrong-- what if they tried to slip something in there and I wasn't being vigilant? (Okay, that also sounded naughtier than intended.) So instead I spent about an hour staring up at the holes on the ceiling, while trying to look complentative lest the dentist folk think I'm a little slow. Of course, trying to look complentative while half of your face is all Bells Palsied up is challenging.
Add to this that I have a hard time when I'm anticipating pain-- I turn into a twitch mess when I get my eyebrows waxed. It's not that it hurts that much-- it's that I think it's going to hurt. Fortunately I took advantage of the fancy TV and switched on Discovery Health. At night that channel, which is probably my favorite, has all kinds of awesome shows like "The Woman With Giant Legs" and "I Didn't Know I was Pregnant" which has seemingly in touch, intelligent women accidentally giving birth into toilets ("I looked down and there was a little face staring up at me") but during the day it was mostly pure birthin' goodness. It seemed to slightly unnerve the dentist and the male dental assistant (Justin Timberlake lookalike!) to have women groaning and bloody vernix-smeared little babies on the TV-- though they shouldn't have been watching-- they're supposed to be paying attention to the dental work, yo!-- it helped me enormously. What a reminder -- a little shot of novocaine in my jaw? A drill barrelling into my pearly (not so) whites? That's nothing. I birthed the ample-headed Max, after all! After that little realization, I calmed down significantly and was able to breathe while pensively examining the ceiling and playing with my half numb face when the dentist took breaks.
I go back Tuesday morning for the rest of the fillings-- hope Discovery Health has something good waiting for me!
Oh, and I'm still obsessed with coupons. Scott thinks I have a problem and I agree. Doesn't that count for something, that I'm not in denial? I'm thinking of starting a new money saving blog to let people know about good local deals. Anybody interested?
Alright, happy holidays to all my readers (hahahahahahahahahahahha). See y'all soon.
Speaking of sweet, despite the fact that I've rarely ingested sugar in the last seven and a half years, (not counting those vanilla soy latte days) I somehow ended up with a mouth full of cavities. It may have been that I didn't go to the dentist for about nine years. How does that happen, you might wonder? Well, it starts by just a bit of procrastination. I'll go next month. And then that next month comes and goes. After a few years of this, it becomes a matter of not wanting to go because I'm embarrased that it's been so long since I've gone. The old "gotta clean up the house before the housekeeper gets here" mentality. Then when I finally went, about a year and a half ago, I had a negative experience with the practice I chose. They tried to get me to buy some fancy schmancy vibrating (!) toothbrush, told me I needed a mouthguard at night (!) and other such silliness. I really was going to get the cavities taken care of at another practice, but then I ended up With Child and the only thing I could tolerate having in my mouth for months was cinnamon toothpaste (and tater tots).
So I finally went back and am getting the seven, yes, seven cavities taken care of. Yesterday was round one. Of course, as fate would have it, the only dentist covered on our otherwise fabulous health coverage is the yucky place I went before. However, I'm far too cheap to just pay out of pocket for dental work, so I sucked it up (so to speak) and went back for another exam. It was actually not so bad. My favorite part being that all the chairs have TVs on them! Since Max was at my parents playing his little heart out, I actually considered asking if I could stick around and just watch TV and maybe take a little nap.
Yesterday I went back for the first chunk of work on my teeth-- I was surprisingly anxious. Or maybe not surprisingly. Does anybody really like to go to the dentist? Besides my dad? It's so awkward-- strange people with gloves spelunking in your mouth. (Okay that sounded way naughtier than I'd planned it to. But I'm leaving it there anyways.) I like having the TV at the dentist because it gives your eyes a place to focus-- perhaps that's my biggest qualm about having people work on your teeth-- they're staring at your face, but at no cost should you try and make eye contact with them. I tried closing my eyes but that felt wrong-- what if they tried to slip something in there and I wasn't being vigilant? (Okay, that also sounded naughtier than intended.) So instead I spent about an hour staring up at the holes on the ceiling, while trying to look complentative lest the dentist folk think I'm a little slow. Of course, trying to look complentative while half of your face is all Bells Palsied up is challenging.
Add to this that I have a hard time when I'm anticipating pain-- I turn into a twitch mess when I get my eyebrows waxed. It's not that it hurts that much-- it's that I think it's going to hurt. Fortunately I took advantage of the fancy TV and switched on Discovery Health. At night that channel, which is probably my favorite, has all kinds of awesome shows like "The Woman With Giant Legs" and "I Didn't Know I was Pregnant" which has seemingly in touch, intelligent women accidentally giving birth into toilets ("I looked down and there was a little face staring up at me") but during the day it was mostly pure birthin' goodness. It seemed to slightly unnerve the dentist and the male dental assistant (Justin Timberlake lookalike!) to have women groaning and bloody vernix-smeared little babies on the TV-- though they shouldn't have been watching-- they're supposed to be paying attention to the dental work, yo!-- it helped me enormously. What a reminder -- a little shot of novocaine in my jaw? A drill barrelling into my pearly (not so) whites? That's nothing. I birthed the ample-headed Max, after all! After that little realization, I calmed down significantly and was able to breathe while pensively examining the ceiling and playing with my half numb face when the dentist took breaks.
I go back Tuesday morning for the rest of the fillings-- hope Discovery Health has something good waiting for me!
Oh, and I'm still obsessed with coupons. Scott thinks I have a problem and I agree. Doesn't that count for something, that I'm not in denial? I'm thinking of starting a new money saving blog to let people know about good local deals. Anybody interested?
Alright, happy holidays to all my readers (hahahahahahahahahahahha). See y'all soon.
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