Dentist Phobia

i never had fear of going as an adult, but i've procrastinated the hell out of it twice, staying away for 8 & 11 year gaps... and paid for it both times, in more ways than one.

to anyone out there who thinks its ok to put off going to the dentist for a decade or so, i can tell you from experience that its a baaaaad idea

I go, but I certainly don't like it. My idea of a good time is not to be lying in a chair with a spotlight in my face, while someone pokes my gums with something sharp and complains that they are bleeding. And has there ever been a flouride that has tasted like what it claims to?

dentist
free duck :
having to go to the dentist really freaked me out - but that was before a little needle-prick helped overcome the pain of drilling .
(btw you know the dentist's joke : "drilling , filling and billing decribes the dentists job")
i know have a really great dentist - a younger fellow . i had to have two root-canals done during the last few years . he suggested that i give him an extra half-hour for the work and he would be able to do it without needle and painlessly .
and he sure was right ! he did his drilling VERY carefully with plenty of breaks , also did a lot of measuring once he had drilled the tooth open .
i had no pain , and the best part was - that's why he recommended it - , i had no post-operative pain , no swollen face .
so when the next tooth was up for "maintenance" , i was ready !
hope it's painless for you !
hbg

Ditto that. So, how baaaaad was it, rp? Do you still have your natural teeth?

I fully expected them to look at the x-rays and start fitting me for dentures. But now that I've actually gone and let someone look in my mouth, I've started thinking about how my teeth can be better. Like, maybe once my wisdom teeth are out my bottom teeth can spread out a bit and stop overlapping. Or maybe I'll have them whitened since I'm having my silver fillings replaced with white. I'm still nervous about all the work that needs to be done, but I'm kind of excited about finally getting it all taken care of.

I finally overcame my anxiety out of sheer necessity-- a molar with a large filling finally cracked off one whole side and it was impossible to ignore it. Fortunately, I found a great dentist and he repaired it without problem and then went on to clean and check all my teeth. He found no problems, surprisingly. It was that fear of other lurking trouble which kept me away for so long.

Long story short, I'm due to go back for a cleaning/checkup next month and am not dreading it a bit.

I totally understand that. What started off as anxiety about long needles and sadistic looking dental equipment turned into the dreading of what major problems lurked in those uncaredfor teeth. I'm determined to face it down now, though. And they've promised to give me nitrous oxide before every procedure, thank god.

yep, still all natural teeth in there
i got my first filling recently -- didn't feel a thing after the novicaine...

my gums needed the brunt of the work after my lengthy hiatuses, so i've gotten to know my periodontist very well

after the 1st session she gave me a strong pain-killer, positive i would need it... turns out a few doses of advil did the trick...

14 years! Wow. Glad you finally went, glad that the damage isn't too bad.

I've moved around a lot in the past dozen years or so and going to a dentist regularly has really suffered because of that. It's always so far down the list of necessities, and then they're always (it seems) booked so far in advance, and it kept being these 2-3 year gaps and then pulling up stakes and moving again and starting all over.

Just went to the local dentist for the second time -- omigod I love these people. For one thing, they provide an interpreter without blinking -- always a huge struggle, thus far. In fact, I haven't had an interpreter at the dentists since... um... I don't think I ever have before this! They also explain things so well -- we all know floss more often and brush at least twice a day, yadda yadda, but they explain specifically how I should brush in a specific place, and what toothbrush to use and why, and there was actual major improvement (in my gums, which I'd been worried about) from my first appointment to my second, based on what they told me.

In fact, all the medical-type stuff is looking so good that they started talking about cosmetic -- I have a tiny chip in one of my front teeth, etc. I'm thinking about gettng a tooth whitening (after a weird, hilarious negotiation with the dentist -- him: "For YOU, I'll charge half price", me: "Am I getting my teeth whitened or buying a carpet??" -- that ended up with what seems to be genuinely a really good price) but I feel kinda weird about it. Today, tooth whitening; tomorrow, Botox. :-?

Wow, soz, that sounds like a great dentist. And a hilarious bargaining exchange.

Teeth whitening to botox, hmmm, I can see that. I was watching a plastic surgery show on Discover Health the other day with the ducklet (I know, she's sick) and it was very interesting. I noticed my resistance to the idea of cosmetic surgery waning the more I watched. Of course, they don't show the recovery process or the invoice for the procedures.

I'm also flirting with the idea of having them straightened if it can be done easily and isn't too expensive. I'm just so relieved that my teeth aren't rotting out of my head that it's suddenly a whole new world.

hamburger, I meant to ask you, how did you overcome your fear of the dentist? Was it just that the technology got better?

free duck
how did i overcome the fear ?
can't really remember , except that after coming to canada , i didn't go to the dentist until i was in a great deal of pain - no choice , but to go !
so i found out that in canada they gave you a little prick - that sure helped me overcome the fear .
hope your experience is a "pleasant" one !
btw our dentist always takes out a bit of time to talk about travel , nice reaturants ... i think it helps relax the mind . hbg

Thanks for the wishes. I hope it's pleasant too. To be honest, it's the prick that used to bother me the most. That and the sound/smell of the drill and just the general discomfort of having someone poking about in my mouth with torture instruments. But I'm told that technology has improved quite a bit since I went last and I hope that's true. Apparently, they can do the crown all in one day now because they make it right there in the office.

I'm a bit nervous about having my wisdom teeth out, but I plan to be asleep for that.

heard a radio ad for a local dental outfit that gives you some sort of pill beforehand, so as to maintain what they referred to as "conscious anesthesia" throughout the procedure...

As a kid, I was terrified of the dentist. I had had some bad experiences as a kid, and was really phobic. I would wait until I had a major league toothache before going to the dentist.

Anyhow, one weekend I had a whizbanger of a toothache. I phoned a service that had dentists on call on the weekends, and I was given a name. I was in my early twenties. The dentist was young, blonde, blue eyed and gorgeous. There was no way that I was going to carry on in front of him. He broke my phobia. Actually, he was a pretty mediocre dentist.

Later on I went to a dentist, who was not as cute, but was an A1 professional. The first thing that he did when I sat in the chair was to hand me a card with all different types of music written on it. I was told to pick what I liked, and was given headphones.

He would give me both novocain and gas, (because I requested it). It really turned out to be as pleasant an experience as dentistry can be, and I stuck with him until I moved down south.

Sounds interesting. As long as they give me the pill AND the novacain, that is.

Be careful after you've had your wisdom teeth out, Ms Duck.

I was told not to eat anything that needed too much chewing for a few days, but they didn't warn me about hot soup.

For about three or four days, your big jaw muscles don't work properly. When you attempt to open your mouth wide, your muscles give all the correct signals that the mouth is open as far as it will go, but don't believe them.
If you feel the front of your mouth, you will find that your upper and lower teeth are only about half an inch apart.

I found this out when I tried to put a spoon of hot soup in my gob. The spoon clunked on my front teeth, and soup spilled down my front. A slight change of tactics on the next spoonful saw me suck the soup off the spoon.
I then realised that the soup was far too hot for my tongue, and couldn't spit it out properly. Not nice.

My recommendations?

WARM (that's WARM) soup.
Thinly sliced banana ( to slide in between teeth)
Warm soup
and thinly sliced banana.

Suddenly, after the fourth day, everything works perfectly again.

Phoenix, that sounds a lot like my phobia. Except that a cute doctor wouldn't be enough to overcome it.

Thanks Lord E. I'll keep that in mind. I don't expect to be very comfortable for a while after the surgery. I was hoping to keep my wisdom teeth. I told the doctor that we should pull the old ones out and keep the new ones. He wasn't convinced.

I wanted to keep mine, but one was pointing north by north west, another was heading backwards down my throat, and the upper two, if left to their own devices, would have ended up living inside my ears.

Oh well.