Does Not Inspire Confidence

On Tuesday, the doodle and I saddled up and made our way to the dentist's office for my semi-annual cleaning. He'd done pretty well on previous visits so I figured he'd hang out and color and life would be good. The visit was a bit overdue since in mid-August we got a note saying that our dentist had retired for health reasons (he'd had a heart attack 2 years-ish ago, and the dental practice was too stressful) and sold his practice. Pushing aside not understanding how being a dentist is stressful (though maybe it was the whole "own your own business" thing, which is certainly stressful - I guess I see all those comfortable, reclining chairs and think, how bad can it be?), I was skeptical about the new dentist. Not sure why...probably because change is scary.

So anyway, when I finally got around to making my appointment, I just took the earliest they had rather than trying to figure out when I could bestow the child on a neighbor. And he did great. And the appointment itself was great, other than the whole "you have two "pre-cavities" that we should just go ahead and take care of before they get deep."

Ok. Fine. So I set up an appointment for that on my way out and I was thinking next week but they were like, "How about Thursday at 9:15?" And I said yes, thinking that I had a friend who was likely to be able to take the kiddo (cause watching mommy get her teeth cleaned is one thing, watching mommy get fillings is another) as she's home most of the time as well.

But of course, she was busy on Thursday.

So yesterday we saddled back up, this time with the stroller and several books and other toys, and made our way back to the office. And we were about five minutes early but right at our appointment time, a new assistant came and took me back for bite wing x-rays. Now, I wasn't sure about this, because I had them in the spring and I'm not used to doing x-rays more than once a year, but I figured maybe they needed them for the fillings so ok, fine. (This clues you in that I've never really had fillings...I've had one other round of "pre-cavities" taken care of -- no numbing, no muss, no fuss. Ten minutes tops.) Then we were put back in the main waiting area. Twenty minutes later, as it was clear that my native was getting restless, I poked my head in the window and asked for an ETA. I was told another 15 - 20 minutes. At which point I was rather unhappy...so I asked what the hold up was. The hygienist was busy with another cleaning.

This was nice, but I still didn't really understand what that had to do with the price of eggs. So I asked why that mattered, as I was there for fillings and there was a pause and confused looks on their end. So I pointed to my chart (which was sitting on their desk) and noted that I had already been in, two days ago, for a cleaning. They looked, nodded, and I was taken back...and also slightly taken aback. Because apparently they thought I was late, even though I had been early.

Dear Right Hand, today we will be doing fillings on Beth. Signed, Left Hand.

So when the dentist came in, I asked him to look and indicate with his pick thingy which teeth he thought he was supposed to be working on, because I didn't actually trust them not to make this even more of a debacle and give me fillings in perfectly good teeth at this point.

He was distraught and apologetic. And he also went right to the correct places that I remembered from Tuesday. So I let things proceed.

And it was ten minutes, maybe fifteen, and I was done. Though I will say it's the roughest filling I've ever gotten and I'm not sure what, if anything I can or should do about it.

I'm using it as an excuse to eat almonds.