Dentists

Dentists.
They're important.

I've always been fortunate with the dentists we've found wherever we've lived. Growing up, I would hear the scary experiences of other children - how much it hurt, how mean the dentist was, how ugly the nurse was, how much she smelled like old lady, etc.

I never had those experiences. Starting with the first dentist I remember, Dr. Crittendon, they were all great.

Well... maybe not all of them. There was this one dentist in Massachusetts. He asked if my jaw was numb before he started the procedure and I said yes, because it did feel numb after the shot. Then he started the drill and I felt it. I swung at him and he got all upset.

"Hey, you could have really hurt me!" he said.
"Not as much as you could have hurt me!" I said.

He gave me so much novacaine at that point, it took me two days to feel the left side of my face.
But I didn't feel any more pain.

Fast forward to today when I had an appointment at a new office because my regular dentist closes his office during the holidays. I called and told the receptionist that I had some pain and I wanted someone to take a look at it. I suppose I could have waited until next week to set up another appointment but I wanted to make sure everything was okay.
After all, you only get one set of permanent teeth.

I showed up five minutes early, gave them my insurance card, and filled out the forms. When I returned the clipboard, the receptionist gave me a slip of paper and directed me to take my own blood pressure.

"That was the first red flag, Mom," Spencer said later when I told the story at the supper table.

I thought it was a little odd, but I gave them the benefit of the doubt and took my own blood pressure thinking that maybe this was more efficient in some way. It was like the machines you see at the pharmacy.
And then I waited almost an hour before approaching the desk.

"Oh, that's not good," Wren said.

While I was waiting at the counter, my name was called so I went back to the chair. The hygienist(?) hung my purse on a hook and mumbled about crowns while she was standing behind me reading from the computer screen. When she came around to face me, she said loudly, like I was hard of hearing, "Is it your crowns? Are you having trouble with your crowns?"

I looked at her like she was growing an extra head, not that she couldn't have used the boost in brain power, and said no.

"That's what it says in your notes," she said, still loud.
"Those aren't my notes," I said.

She signed heavily, like getting the wrong notes for a patient happened all too often throughout the course of her day.

"Okay," I said. "I'm done."
And I got up out of the chair.

"No!" she said.
"Oh yes," I said, standing up and without raising my voice. "I'm done. I waited an hour."

It was one of those times when it was good to be the tallest one in the room. I was often the tallest one in the room when I was going through puberty. As a gangly teenager with braces, I couldn't see the value in it.
As an adult however, it's a good thing.

And just like that, I walked out of the door.

Some would argue that I had already invested so much time that I should have stayed, and maybe if I had only ever experienced the worst in dental care or even mediocre, I would have done just that.

Fortunately, I've had some great dentists. Thank you to all of them for short waits and good care. I'll be giving my regular dentist around the corner a call next week.

It's worth the wait.