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    Thursday, February 19, 2009

    Occlusions

    Yesterday brought a visit to La Dentista. The dentist, for you English speakers. I hate the dentist. It hurts to go to the dentist. I don't care what they do, it hurts. The X-Rays hurt when they make you bite into that piece of rubber that is so carefully placed to scrape its sharp edges against your delicate gums. The cleaning hurts when they take freezing cold water and aim it at your delicate teeth and spray at full force. The scraping hurts, well, okay, the scraping I don't really mind. I'm a little sadistic I guess.

    Anyway, after last weeks trauma of taking Maggie to the dentist, and her screaming and yelling practically getting us kicked out, I wasn't looking forward to going myself. I was fairly confident that I had no cavities, maybe one. I floss every day. I rinse with Listerine every day. I brush every day, at least once. See, confident?

    Nope, shouldn't have been so confident. I came away with a follow up visit and a proposed bill of $1200 for 9 cavities. 9 freaking cavities! What am I, one of Jill's kids?

    Funny thing is, is that the one place I thought I would have a cavity, due to some pain I've been having in my jaw, is the one place there are no cavities present. Weird. But, after reading some comments on Jill's post about their dentist visit, I'm starting to wonder if this doctor is trying to rip me off. She kept giving me this schpeel in her thick Eastern European accent about how hard it is to keep teeth clean with braces on, and how it can cause an eruption of cavities. Yep, right, sounds good, if you're 13, and have braces!

    My braces have been off for 4 years, folks. And I've had several sets of X-Rays since then, and never once had a cavity. Hmm, see where I'm going with this? So I heard some dentists will give you a second opinion for free, so I may go that route. Seems like a better deal than just forking over the money and calling it good.

    Anyway, sorry for the lame A posts as of late. I am getting some better meds soon, and hope to be back to "normal" soon. I need a good post for Fun For Friday, so if any of you have a funny pic you'd like to send me, I'll totally credit you, and I'm sure you'll get some traffic sent your way. Cause I'm so popular and stuff. Feel free to email me at keli dot clayton at gmail dot com.
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    11 Response(s):

    Dalynne Denhof said...

    I really like our dentist, Tina and Noelle go there too, so if u want a second opinion they may be able to help. They are of course from Russia or thereabouts, but so far so good!

    Kalli Ko said...

    my husband hates the dentist for this very reason. fill us in on the 2nd opinion. i definitely think you should get one.

    Jill Johnson said...

    You are totally getting ripped off. All of Carters work was only 1000. The cavities were the cheapest part. Find a new dentist.

    Christian and Karen Robinson said...

    Dentists are of the Devil. I hate them too!
    Maybe your Dentist is quoting the porcelain fillings instead of the silver. Aren't those more? I don't know. I'm certainly NOT trying to defend Dentists.
    My hatred probably comes from the many times of having to have my baby teeth pulled because they would not fall out and my adult teeth were coming in and my mouth was a huge mess. Or, they are just evil.

    Christian and Karen Robinson said...
    This comment has been removed by the author.
    Phoebe said...

    2nd opinion sound in order, but that would mean you would have to go to the dentist again.

    Nikki said...

    You Noorda girls have serious Dentist problems. The first time I give my dentist over 1000.00 for anything other than a crown or orthodontics...He's outa here.

    Course I have the best dentist around. ;)

    I often tell him I would rather spread it for the Gyn, than see him. I think he was secretly offended. LOL!! But really 10 minutes spread, or like 30 with your mouth wedged open, grinding, water spray and all that junk...No contest.

    Elisa said...

    I found you over on Blog Stalkers. I saw you say that you recently moved to Illinois from Utah. I just moved from Illinois to Utah... I'll trade ya! ;> I love Illinois, and Miss it terribly (Even though my fam all lives in UT)

    Fun to find another Illini!

    Larissa said...

    There are a lot of really bad dentists out there. Just like bad chiropractors and they ruin it for everyone else. Find a good dentist with good patient referrals and maybe even find out the good dental schools and make sure they come from there! Ask your cousin what to look for. Definitely get a second opinion! Go get your x-rays from the first dentist and maybe that will save you a little money as well as pain...Good luck!

    Allison Claire said...

    Wow! 9 cavities blows! I hope your second opinion dentist says there is Zero!

    Thank you for the compliment on the pictures, I actually am just wearing a wig, because I am a geek like that! I was bored one day so I pulled out the black wig and red lipstick and had a photo shoot.

    I am so glad you like my music player, now I have extra pressure to find songs that don't suck! :)

    Eryn said...

    I had a dentist that messed up my teeth BIG time by filling cavities that I didn't have, and reshaping teeth that he thought MIGHT give me trouble later down the road. So he drilled, ruining the integrity of the teeth.

    THEN he would fill in the holes with the wrong type of filling and they would fall out within a month, sending us back again.

    When we later joined a class action suit against him, we got a whopping $10.

    Yippie! Too bad the damage he did has cost us around $100,000 over the years, with more to come.

    Good luck! And how would you recommend braces in your adulthood? They're suggesting them for my husband, and he's 100% against the idea. Braces are PRETTY far down the list of things that I need done for my teeth, sadly.