I am upset. My mouth has betrayed me. Evolution has betrayed me. Colgate has betrayed me. And don't even get me started on dentists.
Why on earth do our bodies still come with spare parts? As in, things that we can function perfectly well without. Or even better, that serve absolutely no purpose other than taking up space and randomly breaking from time to time, such as appendices, spleens (lucky me, I have a spare...go figure), tonsils, and wisdom teeth? However, we do have them, and they do cause us trouble sometimes, which raises the question of the necessity of preventative medicine. If something may possibly go bad, should we just go ahead and get rid of it? If so, how far should we take it? My appendix may burst someday. Carve it out. My tonsils may make it impossible to swallow my cheeseburger. Snip, snip. My boobies may grow tumors. Chop 'em off. My brain may go postal. One lobotomy, please. Where does the madness stop? In my opinion, it should stop with unnecessary tooth yankage. But the world never works like we want it to, does it?
I have always been a bit cocky about my teeth. After all, they're a terrific set. Especially after wrangling them into a perfect row in high school with lots of metal wires and tiny colorful rubber bands (the glow-in-the-dark ones were the coolest!). And they've never allowed even one tiny sugar bug to wriggle in there anywhere (that's pediatric dentistry-speak for cavities). That's right. I've never had a cavity. Sorry if I sound smug, but that's because I simply recognize how awesome I am. I just have this sixth sense about stuff being stuck in my teeth. I always travel fully armed with both floss and toothpicks. Or rather, floss picks. Best of both worlds. But I digress.
After going about seven years without a visit to the dentist's chair, I became slightly paranoid after having the glue of my permanent retainer pop loose from one tooth. Visions of a tiny piece of cilantro slipping in between the glue and tooth and wreaking havoc on my dentin haunted me for weeks. That cilantro will get you, one way or another. Anyways, I sucked it up and signed on with my work's dental insurance. And then I went to the dentist. Cue the dramatic music.
As some of you know, I worked for a short while a couple of years ago as a dental assistant at Sarrell Regional Dental Center in Bessemer. Didn't work there long enough to get the free dental exam, unfortunately. Although I found the work incredibly interesting and challenging, my time there was cut short by my thumb's encounter with a used hypodermic needle. And also probably by my refusal to stroke ego and kiss ass, which is what the pompous CEO of Sarrell requires of his employees. After a frantic run to the local lab for blood tests, and one morbid week spent convinced I had given myself both AIDS and hepatitis (neither of which turned out to be true, thanks be to the gods of blood-borne illnesses), I had learned a valuable lesson about how NOT to clean a dental tray. Alas, it was no good. I was sent away soon after a visit from several corporate jackasses and a firm "This will be your last day. Leave now." I did, however, take with me a good working knowledge of the interior of the mouth and all the various bad things that can happen to it. And also several pocketsful of toothpaste. I'm KIDDING! The lady jackass watched way too closely for me to take anything along as I left. It's like she was expecting it. The hussy.
Anyways, because of all the rotten mouths I'd stuck my fingers into while at Sarrell, I wasn't really that concerned about my first dentist visit in such a long time. I'm prone to jamming a hand mirror into my mouth and inspecting the state of things from time to time, and I was pretty sure I was still in good shape. A little staining in the grooves, but a quick poke with a straight pin to check for stickiness and my mind was back at ease. Don't judge me for my methods of self-delusion. I'm sure you do some pretty sick stuff to yourself too. So when the dentist said everything looked good, I became smug once again. And then he started in on the wisdom-tooth tirade.
I would just like to say that I was fully expecting this. For some reason, dental professionals have an intense hatred for the humble wisdom tooth and yank them out left and right. It's like an epic feud. Which I think is stupid because mine have never given me even a tiny twinge of trouble. I only have three, two on top and one of the bottom left that never emerged. What became of the other one, I have no idea. Maybe it got stuck in Limbo at my birth and I'll meet up with it again someday on the Other Side. Anyways, my x-rays showed my happy little wisdom teeth living healthily in the back of my mouth and minding their own business. The bottom one that was still in hiding looked healthy too, and at first I didn't even notice the spooky little shadow lurking around the root of the tooth. My dentist was happy to point it out though, and gleefully informed me that it was a cyst and would continue to grow if the tooth wasn't removed. On top of that, he said my other two wisdom teeth on top had small cavities in them. So small that they didn't show up on the x-rays, apparently. "BS!" is what I wanted to shout. Instead, I insisted that my wisdom teeth were just fine and I wanted to keep them because I like them. Bewildered by my dogged refusal to listen to reason, the dentist gave me a referral card for an oral surgeon "just in case" and sent me on my way.
Subsequent research at home (made easier by my bestest best friend, Google) drew up alarming information that cysts around impacted wisdom teeth have been known to eventually crack the jawbone if left to grow unchecked. Well, I don't know about you, but a cracked jawbone sounds unpleasant. I'm not sure how I am with pain, having never really had my threshold tested, but it started to dawn on me that some preventative medicine might actually keep my face from someday becoming horror-movie ready. I saw a preview of a new gory demon flick the other day, and before it dawned on me to cover my eyes like I usually do, I accidentally viewed a possessed girl's jaw dislocating. It was beyond disturbing, and the image of her face sprung immediately to my mind when I read about tooth cysts. I don't ever want my face to look like that. Except if I'm cast in a movie and they pay me the big bucks to be made up to look like that. Otherwise, no thanks.
So I made the appointment to just go ahead and have them all out. Next Friday at 9am I will be settling down into a cold plastic chair at the oral surgeon's office and being shot in the face with lots of drugs. Having never done drugs myself, I'm not sure how this is going to go. My only attempt at becoming a junkie was in a park in Madrid with a tiny hash pipe that wouldn't stay lit. I took it as a sign. But don't worry, faithful readers. I'll be sure to give you a blow-by-blow, or rather a yank-by-yank, so's you can once again enjoy my misfortune. Assuming that I remember anything, of course. Here's hoping for dry socket and full-blown chipmunk cheeks. Maybe I'll even post a picture this time.
