Sometime last December I finally quit procrastinating and went for my semi-annual teeth cleaning fest. I was delaying the visit because I had no dental insurance at the time but I finally decided the health of my teeth was worth a cool hundred and some-odd dollars. Also, I figured that if one’s teeth hurt every time one bit into a tasty confectionery product, it can’t be good.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, I did not inherit my mother’s naturally straight teeth nor her excellent flossing habits, but I did acquire my dad’s penchant for cavities. Well, non-flossing plus weak teeth plus an attraction to chocolate equals the worst kind of cavity, the kind that is in between two teeth; therefore, both teeth must be filled. They said I had two of these kinds of cavities: right in between my first two molars in the top of my mouth on both sides. That explains the sugar pain. Joy and rapture.<\/p>\n
They gave me a lecture on flossing that truly scared me shitless — it started off with the question, “Do you want to keep your teeth?” — then drew up an estimate for four fillings. One look at that estimate told me I’d definitely have to wait until I got some insurance, which thankfully happened a little over a month later.<\/p>\n
I had all four of them filled one day in March soon after we moved into our house. It gave me an excuse from constant unpacking but I sure was sore when all was drilled and filled. It had been quite a while since I had last gotten a filling and I had forgotten how weird it was.<\/p>\n
Here I must confess I have always found dental procedures quite hilarious at times and I usually have to restrain myself from laughing. This is why I close my eyes when I’m getting worked on: just watching someone looking down my mouth with such a look of concentration — or sometimes, surprise — just strikes me funny. Getting struck with the silly giggles during a filling procedure could hurt quite a bit since you’ve got a bunch of metal protrusions sticking out of your mouth. Thankfully I was able to fend off the giggles this time.<\/p>\n
Two weeks after that joyous experience my teeth were still quite sensitive, especially to cold. Even tap water set my teeth to aching. This pain was a good bit worse than the sugar pains of months past. Well, back to the dentist I go, where he files down my fillings a bit and double-checks the bite. Two weeks later, I’m back again for some more filing and bite-checking. Two more weeks later, I have the metal filings taken out and white enamel filings put in, with the idea being the cold-conducting properties of metal does not agree with my apparently sensitive front molars.<\/p>\n
You know what’s worse than having four filings put in? It’s having four filings drilled out, then new ones put in. One would think that anything involving small teeth would be a delicate process, but all you need is a dremmel-type dentist tool and some safety goggles. Little boulders of aluminum filling were flying everywhere. I could hear them bouncing off the walls! It was a dental hailstorm. I had my eyes squinted shut, trying so hard to think of something else so I wouldn’t bust out laughing. My anti-giggle resolve has been soundly tested of late. So far, so good.<\/p>\n
The enamel filings, which is what I originally wanted but the insurance company classifies them as ‘cosmetic,’ seemed to do the trick. I could drink a glass of water and eat salads with no stabbing pain, huzzah! All was fine . . . except for tooth #5, that evil little bugger on the top right side. It took a quick dislike to having small, hard bits of food being chomped on, especially little raspberry seeds from my favourite jelly. Damn that #5!<\/p>\n
So once again I’m back at the dentist for some more filing and poking, which only seemed to make #5 even more sensitive. The phobia to cold things also came back with a vengeance. By this time I was getting to know my dentist very well.<\/p>\n
Then one day after another session of filing and bite-checking, he said the scariest phrase I’ve ever heard come out of a dentist’s mouth: “root canal.” Cue the scary music in a minor chord here. He wasn’t for certain, though, and wanted me to visit an endodontist to get his opinion and make absolutely sure.<\/p>\n
I ran by Mr. Endodontist sometime last week to be poked and prodded yet again. It was his personal mission to harass #5 until the little bugger was provoked to harass me. This he did by spraying a cotton ball with something — I’m guessing liquid nitrogen here — and holding it on #5, My Oppressor.<\/p>\n
SWEET GRAHAM CRACKER, DID THAT EVER HURT!<\/p>\n
So, three guesses as to who’s getting a root canal in the near future. The first two don’t count.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sometime last December I finally quit procrastinating and went for my semi-annual teeth cleaning fest. I was delaying the visit because I had no dental insurance at the time but I finally decided the health of my teeth was worth a cool hundred and some-odd dollars. Also, I figured that if one’s teeth hurt every […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchythoughts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}