Tuesday, February 5, 2013

the slippery slope




Well, it's finally happened. I am finally the clueless old woman. I've forgotten how to spell, I can't remember words, I leave the oven on, and now I can't even tell if my dental work is there.

Now that our personal financial fortunes have been lifted somewhat, I decided to get some dental work done...a crown glued back on that came off over two years ago and a repair of the filling I recently lost in my most back molar.

I lost the crown on an airplane en route to my niece's Bat Mitzvah while eating a muffin several years ago and just never got around to getting it glued back on. I didn't really have a dentist and I didn't want to pay an unrealistic amount for some guy to cover his ass.

My first encounter with this new dentist in this small town was to have my crown glued back on. He wanted to make a new one to the tune of $950 because the old one no longer fit perfectly due to shifting.

Just make the old one work I told him. So then I got the 'I'm not responsible if something bad happens' disclaimer (which is in itself a sad commentary of the lack of personal responsibility and the blame game in this country) and then he did make it work and did a good job of it too.

I went back two weeks later, yesterday, to get the filling repaired. Mouth numbed, he drilled away the last fragments of the old composite and replaced it with whatever it is that dentists currently use for fillings. It was quick and easy relatively speaking then he slapped me on my rump and sent me out to pasture.

Just kidding. Not about the quick and easy part, that part was true.

When I got home, I waited a bit, and then fixed a late breakfast of oatmeal with banana. By the time I finished eating, the numbness had mostly dissipated and I felt around in my mouth with my tongue, testing the new filling and, and, wait a minute, there's a deep hole in my molar, where's the damn filling!

So I called the dental office to explain that my brand new filling not even two hours old is gone.

Three hours later, I'm back in the dentist's chair and he's telling me that yes, it is still there. That the tooth is wallowed out but filled and shored up. Well, alrighty then, that makes me feel really foolish. I'm sure everyone in the office had a good laugh at the clueless old woman who is so demented she can't even tell if her dental work is there.

It still feels really deep, as deep as it felt after the old filling came out and I don't remember it feeling that deep with the old filling but perhaps my shifting bite is why it came loose and broke apart in the first place.

Anyway, in the immortal words of Rosanne Rosannadanna...

Never mind.



18 comments:

  1. Clueless is the last word I would use to describe you.

    Who wants to think about teeth? I mean, really.

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  2. You gave the dental office a laugh, I'm sure. Just think of it as doing a good deed for the day.

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  3. "And what's all this about crowns? Thought I was queen for a day, when they said I need one instead they put it in MY MOUTH and glued it shut!"
    Mr. Man is a restorative dentist, a brilliant one in fact, he has saved not only many mouths but many lives, finding cancer and issues around the head and neck area that usually goes amiss in a physicians check up. Teeth are incredibly important as it turns out- One's general health can be determined by teeth and gums.
    I am older than you - I lost my car keys for an entire week!
    They were in my purse....

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  4. omg.....I couldn't help but laugh in commiseration....I get it. Oma Linda

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  5. I just detest going to the dentist. There's usually some kind of not-good news, mostly related to having no fluoride in drinking water back in the day. Every time they do something to my teeth, my mouth feels different afterwards so I'm not surprised you thought you were missing something. I bet they get this all the time, people coming back b/c it doesn't feel right.

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  6. I need a helmet like that. Or a good swift kick, or something.

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  7. Ahhh...the mysteries of life!! And dentistry!
    Glad you got your teeth repaired.
    Hugs
    SueAnn

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  8. I had a filling replaced once & the guy didn't file it down enough. It was so bad that my jaw started aching terribly (made it hard to eat, which come to think of it is NOT a bad thing necessarily). I went to another dentist who filed that sucker down & then I was just fine.

    I'm laughing (kindly) at Linda Sue & her keys :)

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  9. Gawd I love you. This is so funny, but trust I am not laughing AT you as much as WITH you. In a way that I am thinking "There but for the grace of God, go you Skippy..."

    Yeesh. This is one for the books ellen. And I like the "slap on the rump and out to pasture" line. Sweet. Wish I had thought of it.

    Enjoy your new "tooth" - and if you ever get an inkling that it might be gone, take a cellphone pic of the inside of your mouth and shoot it to me. I'll check before I let you embarrass yourself again.

    Hey, it's what friends do. Hugs! Thanks for the smiles.

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  10. Well since most work like that is done on older people I am guessing that many times they encounter the same issue. If it feels that comfortable he did a great job.

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  11. I was sent for a periodontal evaluation recently. Actually, I liked the guy. Younger than me, of course (I should be retired!), and as he measured and noted his way down my teeth he prefaced most everything wtih Your Generation bla bla bla.

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  12. You made me laugh. And then I realized I'd probably do the same thing. Like Kerry said, our mouths usually do feel different/wrong after most dental work. Still, you made me laugh.

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  13. Ha! I love Roseanne Roseannadanna!

    I bet your dentist gets this kind of thing more often than he'd care to admit. Dental work always feels so weird when the novocaine wears off. When I had my crown replaced it felt very odd, and then within a day or two it felt completely normal again.

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  14. This made me chuckle A LOT.

    I haven't been to the dentist in a few years since I relocated .... it always plays on my mind. Maybe I should fix that!

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  15. I'm just curious about where the crown was from the time it came off to when you visited the dentist?? Did you put it in your coin purse (I would) .... ? & then pulll it out while sitting in the dentist chair & say "glue the ole girl back in!"

    Love it ! :)

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  16. oh this is me!!
    I have done so many things like this
    I once swore that dissolved stitches had not dissolved because I could "sense" them there, I don't know what I was thinking

    loved your comment about me needing to move to higher ground, trust me it's a serious thought I've been having
    this anxiety is a bit more than I can handle

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I opened my big mouth, now it's your turn.