No, I am not exaggerating. The root canal was the best part of my trip to the dentist.
I suppose you could say that the whole thing was all part of the same procedure, and that there is no point trying to separate parts out of it, but the actual part where the sadist… I mean dentist… was drilling deep into my head was not all that bed… untill either the numbing medication started to wear off or he hit a nerve that it didn’t ever reach. Okay, that hurt… quite a lot… so maybe I should just start at the beginning.
First, it took him a long time to get me numb. I seem to be resistant to the numbing stuff. So he had to poke that needle in for quite a while. I love they way they don’t just stick it in, they have to wiggle and prod and push and jab. But I expected that to happen. Then once they got started, the dentist kept asking his assistant for tools that she couldn’t find. She kept going off in search of certain sized drills and probes and torture devices. So things just really dragged on and on.
When she failed to come up with some drill he needed, he decided to use the older electric one. He jammed it in my tooth and there was an anticlimactic buzzing sound and the drill felt like it was turning slower than the hour hand on a clock. Guess what. No batteries. Off goes the assistant to find some. Ten minutes later she gives up. And then the girl from the front desk comes back and says, “You want me to run over to Home Depot and get some batteries?”
I had already been laying there holding my mouth open for more than an hour, and I wasn’t sure I was nearly as numb as I wanted to be. But after quite a while we had the batteries and we were back in business. One of the last steps they do for a root canal is stick a thin plastic sliver into the now hollow root. This is a sealant of some sort. Then they stick a hot tool of some kind in the hole and it melts the plastic sealant and, uh, seals it all up nice and tight. I figured we were done with worst part. Then I feel this shooting pain in my lower lip… the one that isn’t numb at all, and hear a sizzling sound, and I smell burning flesh. I said ‘ow’ as well as I could under the circumstances. Yeah, that’s right, he accidentally… ha, acci/dentally, get it?… stuck the hot melting tool to my lower lip. And it still had a drip of hot plastic stuck to the end.
But other than that, I am fine, thanks for asking.
Pouring My Art Out 
Good God Almighty! Just what kind of dentist did you go to??? I have never heard of such a frick and frack and the chinese fire drill crew outfit being allowed to have a permit to operate on people before. Did you feel like you had stepped into the 3 Stooges playing dentist or something? So what did the moron say when he melted your lip? Uh, sorry dude? He should not have charged you for the whole visit after that. Don’t dentists worry about malpractice? And what was he billing the insurance company? By the hour or something? Anything to stall things and drag it out longer? Sheesh. You showed great restraint and wisdom by not having an arm jerk reaction to his nether regions while he was working but if you ever go back to this one again and if you don’t complain to some higher authority and your insurance company about him then your wisdom atta boy gets turned into an aw shit, fella. I mean think about it…would you want him and his crew working on one of your daughters? I know there is always gonna be the bottom half of the graduating class and all but seriously, this sounds ridiculous. I am glad you are finished and hope you got some good drugs to help the pain while it heals now….um…they DID wear gloves or at least wash their hands didn’t they? Or you are gonna need more antibiotics too. Sigh…
Wow, you are more worked up than I was. He has always been a pretty good dentist up to this point. I guess I am just mellowing in my old age.
Ok. Did this guy get his license in a Cracker Jack box?!?!? That sounds like about the worst dentist visit ever – and I never heard if a good one so… You are brave and strong and crazy all wrapped into one. Why didn’t you hall off and drill that guy yourself!!???!!? BAM! One shot!
I hope, all said and done, you’re feeling better than when you got there. YIKES and holy crap!
Never hit anyone who is putting power tools in your face, I always say.
Never thought of that. Good thinking.
Because I was tempted to hit him right in nuts… just sayin’…
well that just added to my already horrible phobia of dentists! i hope he didn’t charge you! “Ow” is all you said?? I don’t care what was in my mouth, i would be saying more than that!
is this a practicle joke payback? 😉
I was going to punch him in the nuts, but I didn’t want his hands to be shaking.
ahaha, you could have when he was finished.
I just wanted to go home by then. And what if I had to go back?
you would go back to that one again??
are you hurtin now?
I feel pretty good, but you gotta go where the insurance covers you.
for sure but aren’t there any others where it covers you? good that you’re feeling okay!
He isn’t always that bad. It was just that kind of a day… week… month… year… But I’ll be there for you… sorry, I was channeling Friends.
say what?
The theme song from the TV show Friends… try to keep up.
ahaha! brain on slow mo today
How do you know?
it’s my brain..
Is it?
yes not functioning at full capacity today.
Are you sure?
nope because a not functioning to full capacity brain can’t figure that out 😉
How does that make you feel?
out of sorts i think
Will you be okay?
for sure it was the day before yesterday, well maybe some yesterday too that i felt that way.
But you are better now?
Ouch indeed – cripes.
A story we can all very much relate to.
All I ever think about now when I go to the dentist is Steve Martin’s dentist in Little Shop of Horrors – that allows me to laugh the pain off a little while they’re puncturing my mouth with sedative before getting out the Black & Decker drill bits.
I also liken going to the dental hygienist when the pull out their lovely scraping equipment very much to the film Hellraiser, all they need is a couple of chains on those big ole hooks and they might as well be bass fishing in your mouth!
The only thing worse than messing with my teeth is messing with my feet (in a non-consensual way like gouging out a verrucca – thankfully I haven’t had one of those in years).
Glad to hear you are fine – the emotional scars should heal soon too in maybe 10-25 years, give or take a few Christmases (mine, not yours).
Thanks for caring. Even holding your mouth open for two hours hurts. But I guess it is still better than the big infected mess that was going on in there last week.
Okay, PMAO. I am not very happy on your behalf. I feel certain that the root canal was a costly procedure and I am stunned, amazed, and completely pissed off that those bumblers were ill equipped to treat you! This is why the world is full of anti-dentis… .
They are usually pretty good. This guy looked like he was about 20 years old. I got the Doogie Howser dentist.
I love dentists so much I put by an allowance of £2000 a year to spend there. 4 root canals last year = £2000, two crowns this year – £1440 and two next year £1440. And a couple of impacted wisdom ttthe extractions which were done for free on the NHS.
They left a bit of the scrapy tool they weed the root out with in the canal, after they sealed it up. I knew something was wrong, they said it would probably be fine….right before they demanded I settle the bill.
After enduring so much torture I’d make a great spy, no amount of interrogation would make me spill the beans, I can take some oral abuse (nifty double entendre too)
I thought you guys had like free medical coverage in your country. You know, what the Republicans call socialized medacin.
For dental there is but it is a quick fix, dentists have to offer the cheap service but they can’t afford to, and they would use cheaper materials.
Good for an emergency when you are in agonising pain but you need to go and get it done properly afterwards.
I am fine with that for teeth but for any other medical condistions I wouldn’t like bits held together with double sided tape and some staples
They make your system sound so good when they talk about it here. Like everything is just free.
Hospital treatment is, but you can have long waiting lists.
If you are in an emergency, they are brilliant, like a car crash, they’l just see to you and save your life, don’t you all need insurance before they touch you?
But if you just need a routine operation, you’ll just be waiting a while on the list. Waiting time just depends on your case, a friend needs help but they won’t do it, he needs to have this done, he lives with daily intense pain due to his condition. But it is not deemed important, if you knew the full extent of his condition you would find it incredible they won’t do anything, but by the same token they will give someone a boob job if they show the slightest sign of unhappiness with having boobs that affect their confidence.
It has its pros and cons. The pros definitely it is free and everyone can get help. Cons is that people abuse the system.
People mess everything up. Maybe the plastic surgeons are less busy than the real ones.