Oral Hygeine-x (Hijinks)
Yesterday, as devoted readers already know I had to return to the dentist to get a cavity filled. Devoted readers and those who know me, also know I can be an awkward person. When an awkward person is put in an awkward situation things get exponentially worse. I submit for your approval, Return To The Dentist.
Things started out alright. I didn’t wait long to be seen, an attractive, young dentist helper (Hygienist if you will) came to get me, it looked like smooth sailing. As the dentist was novacaine-ing me up things took a turn. He asked me twice in the 45 second span if I was alright. I’ve had a couple of cavities filled in my life, so I knew what to expect, and I wasn’t in pain. Him asking twice though lead me to believe I must have been conveying a sense of distress. The second time I grunted to him as happily as a person could with a hand in his mouth and a needle in his gums.
At this point the dentist also decided he was going to re-do a previously filled cavity because he didn’t like how it looked. In my continued effort to reassure him I was fine I say, “I think I can take 15 more minutes with you,” while forcing a laugh. There is no response.
The hygienist puts some tubes in my mouth while I watch the dentist get the drill ready. He presses it on a couple times and then asks if I’m alright again. He has to be messing with me at this point. I lay back as the chair reclines, consciously thinking about what I can do with my hands to make myself appear relaxed. I lay them across the armrests, but decide it makes me look too stiff. I bring them together over my crotch before realizing you never look relaxed when covering your groin. I let them hang to the floor for a second, but that’s actually uncomfortable and probably my stupidest option of all. I finally bring them back to the arm rests considering that’s what the arm rests are for.
By the time I’m done solving the arm dilemma it comes to my attention there’s another dentist in the room making small talk with my dentist. The new dentist makes the off hand comment that “This one looks nervous” and signals towards me. Really? Really!? I let out another reassuring grunt, if grunts can even be reassuring, and he leaves.
As the procedure gets underway I’m laying back just staring at the flourescent light fixture above me. I’m actually very relaxed, reguardless of what the oral team working on me thinks. The problem is at this point I’m TOO relaxed. I kind of start falling asleep (I was on half the amount of sleep I had grown used to over the break, 5 hours) and they may have taken this as fainting. They fire off a barrage of “Are you alrights?” back and forth. I nod and shoot back with another grunt. At this point it becomes clear I need to keep my mind busy. I look at the dentist’s microscope-eye glasses-light apparatus on his face. It’s pretty cool but pretty blinding so I have to look elsewhere. I look to the left at the hygienist but I don’t want to be a creep and make it seem like I’m staring at her suggestively, especially since she already thinks there’s something wrong with me. I try to guess how old she is in my head. I’m thinking between 25 and 30, probably closer to 30 though. Maybe 28? 29? I also start re-thinking if she’s actually attractive. I debate this for a couple of seconds before going back to my original assertion that she is indeed attractive.
My attention now turns towards a pool of saliva forming in my mouth. There’s a suction tube hooked into my mouth, but it isn’t getting the job done. I try swallowing with my mouth open but nothing’s doing. I try again but harder and somehow manage to spit it up onto my face. The dentist pauses, takes the dental bib to wipe my face and tells me to be careful. I’ve gone from overly nervous to mentally retarded to them. It’s dangerous whenever you become conscious of normally innate functions like swallowing or breathing. I suddenly can’t swallow without manually doing it anymore. Like I said earlier, I’ve gotten cavities filled in the past and I’ve never struggled like this before. I could accept the blame for this situation, but instead I choose to blame the suction tube for not doing the one job it has. With saliva building up at an alarming rate I quickly close my mouth and swallow hard, breaking a little plastic thing that was jammed between two of my teeth. The dentist, not pleased, replaces it and warns me not to do this again. Things are getting tense.
After a little more drilling, scraping, pasting, prodding, swabbing and NOT suctioning, the procedure was done. He took a mirror to show me that the old filling was much less visible now, and it did actually look a lot better. I also saw my top lip was so dry that the skin was peeling off everywhere. I licked my lips, thanked the dentist and his assisstant, shook his hand and we went on our seperate ways, both parties relieved that it was over.
Stayed tuned for my next post: “The Trouble With Eating Wendys When Half Of Your Face Is Numb”
