My Chompers

In my head all I could think was, “They aren’t going to show that, right?!”. They did. You’d think I could have just looked away, or closed my eyes– I mean come on I could at least control that aspect, I wasn’t in the contraption from A Clockwork Orange. Oh no, I was in a worse place… I was at the dentist.

For context let me take you back to roughly the beginning, of my “adult teeth” that is. In the second grade, right when all of those permanent chompers start coming in, I was picked up and dropped directly on my chin by another student randomly in the boys’ bathroom. The incident gave me my first experience with getting stitches, of which I have a scar that almost exactly matches the one on Leonardo DiCaprio’s chin. Sidenote on Leo’s chin scar, I could not confirm if that was from when he was also randomly attacked (by a model with a bottle (yea rhymes!) who mistook him for her ex-boyfriend) or from something else… if you know, let me know.

Anyways, the other major result of my attack was that all of those precious new teeth that just started coming in, well a lot of them got chipped. The memory of spitting out chunks of teeth still haunts me, as well as the dental appointments that came right after. This has admittedly caused me a good deal of anxiety any time I have had dental visits, so much that, yeah, I flat out didn’t go for a good part of my entire 20’s. Definitely not the smartest thing to do.

The following years I paid the price, having multiple fillings, a very expensive root canal (of which failed a few years later while eating Taco Bell of all things. “Wow, that is a crunchy shell! Nope nope, that’s my crown”), and other unpleasantries. Have you ever had a dentist’s sweat drops fall on your face as they try to pull tooth fragments out of your jawbone? I don’t recommend it. When I get x-rays now my teeth look all lit up like a Christmas tree.

Well after those experiences I really didn’t want to sit in that ol’ reclining chair of anguish again until I had to get false teeth. My puppy though decided to change that as she turned me into a carbon-copy of Lloyd Chrismtas with one quick swoop of her head. Boom! Right in the kisser! I was forced to go back.

I decided to try a new dentist, one with TVs and such to hopefully help me relax. As the dentist examined my mouth and decided to finally go down the full route of shame and agreed to get everything fixed that he pointed out. Plus my insurance at the time rocked!

This new office experience was quite pleasant actually. The dentist was funny and entertaining. I had him put on “The Other Guys” movie during our first long session- apparently he had never seen it as he had to stop a few times because he was laughing so hard at it. A little scary with drills involved to be quite honest. He did a good job at getting me back on track, however I then moved out of the city and to the burbs of Jersey, which brings me to the present day.

Have you seen the latest episode of Severance (S2E7)? If not, the premise is that people’s brains are microchipped to not be aware of or remember unpleasant experiences in their life. Working is the main thing they are “severed” from having to go through, however in this episode one of the character’s “innies” goes to the dentist. Well guess where my new dentist is located- that’s right, in the actual building where that show is filmed!

Which finally brings us to the opening line of this blog… what did they show? Well I recently had to go through a process called “root planing” due to a lot of inflammation in my gums. It’s not pleasant, however this office does their best to relax you, which also includes Netflix on a TV above you. When the process was starting I saw a skiing documentary on. I love skiing and found it nice and relaxing and a great distraction from the ultra-sonic waves of this device deep in the gums of my mouth.

In the middle of the documentary I realize it is about a paralyzed skier. It’s impressive to watch him learn how to ski in a uniski chair and he even does some crazy drops that I’d never think of doing as a fully able-bodied person. My mind was fully on this doc, it was doing its job.

Then, it happened. The dilemma. This documentary was going off of the slopes and into the home of the skier. So there were some of the struggles of getting out of bed, navigating the kitchen in a wheelchair, taking a shower even. It’s definitely hard and I understand why they show it, it’s part of his story. But then it came to the bathroom.

Normally I would expect a documentary to keep things like this more discrete and just talk about it. However this director decided that he’s going full in your face on the subject matter. It started with a catheter. I thought of looking away, but the sound of this device in my mouth was too unpleasant. Right after that came the suppositories, and yes, they showed him on the toilet literally “putting them in place”.

Sooooo yeah- how’s your experiences with the dentist been in your life?

On my next visit I did tell the hygienist about it and she had a good laugh. She made sure I had access to the remote going forward just in case. Now hopefully I’m on the right track to not have to many more unpleasant times- I’m spraying water all over my bathroom with a new waterpik now and seem to have a good plan moving forward. Wish me luck!