The tooth fairy didn't show up.

I have to vent. I had a dentist appointment this morning, which made me happy.

To understand why I could possibly be happy having gone to the dentist, let me explain:
The only dentist I had ever had was my pediatric dentist until I was 17 or 18 years old. Yeah, I’ve been slack, but for most of those years, I didn’t have any dental insurance. Paying full non-insured price was out of the question. I slacked off and gained a few cavities in the process.

I wasn’t even going to go last year until I felt a ridge on one of my teeth. I found out later, it was a cracked tooth due to my wisdom teeth compressing my bottom jaw. Over time, my weakest tooth cracked (having a cavity there didn’t help) and that’s what the ridge was. Finally, I had a hole back there and had to deal with it. Talk about sensitive, too!

I basically picked a dentist out of the phone book to have that procedure done, since it was an emergency. I couldn’t find my pediatric dentist anymore, so I didn’t have a choice.

I have increasingly sensitive teeth since my wisdom teeth have wreaked serious havoc on my whole mouth… especially my bottom row, which has moved forward about ½ cm since then. My once decent row of almost straight teeth now look like my car floorboard when I have to slam on the brakes and all of my belongings in the passenger seat go crashing to the floor. LOL

Due to sensitivity, I can’t even have happy 6-month cleanings without pain. Dental floss is an avoidable situation there as well. I do it at home b/c I know how much I can handle, but they don’t know that there.

Anyway, I went to the “throw a dart in the phone book” dentist, where everything seemed to be ok, but he wouldn’t use the gas to prep me for shots b/c “he didn’t believe in it” and wouldn’t give me enough shots in my jaw anyway. I guess he thought I was a junkie when I told him I needed more. Bad thing is this: I have a low tolerance for pain, but a high tolerance against medication.. Anything, if it even works in the 1st place, has to be taken at double after the first dosage or I get no effects. Finally, he decided to give me more when AFTER he drilled, I had tears coming out of my eyes. He had to rebuild the broken tooth, so I was there awhile and the shots started wearing off, too. The good thing is that he did refer me to a wonderful plastic surgeon for the wisdom teeth surgery (why it was a plastic surgeon, I’ll never know, but he really took care of me).

I told my co-worker, Danielle, about my dental nightmare yesterday. Today I went to Danielle’s dentist as a referral. Here’s my experience:

I showed up, filled out new patient paperwork and waited an acceptable amount of time to be seen. I sat down and noticed that the chair had a BACK MASSAGER/HEATER on it. Oh, I was in heaven! They used the “happy gas” on me for my cleaning, which relaxed me to the point where I didn’t care that they were scraping my already sensitive teeth, which normally feels like they’re pulling the root out from the top.

Other dart-dentist news: He didn’t completely get rid of the decay from the broken tooth. I found that out today, which is why I said “vent” earlier. So now I have a cavity under my filling. A filling which, by the way, I didn’t even want as a metal filling, but as a white, but he “didn’t believe in that either.” Geez…

I had better not need a root canal… it’s a possibility.

Grr.