Debating Dental Decisions

I am not a big fan of dentists. I've had more than one or two downright awful experiences with them. I don't enjoy going but I make my appointments religiously to ward off having to go any more often than that.

Somehow between November and early May, I managed to get two cavities. Don't tell Trinity as I will never hear the end of it. I got one or two while I was pregnant with her and two while I was pregnant with Will. My teeth react poorly to growing babies for some reason. So anyway, I was SHOCKED.

So yesterday I went to the new, sweet voiced, cutesy dentist I had chosen. They started my nitrous going and put on the topical. (A girl has to have her nitrous you know!) She numbed right under the tooth again and again and again and then it was time to start. She had barely started drilling when I felt a cold sensation and I knew all too well what that was.

So she stopped. Then she gave more and more and more anesthetic to the same place and waited. After 5 minutes, she started to drill again. Almost immediately, it was cold again.

This time she went for the main nerve in the back of my mouth where my jaw hinges. I was thrilled to know this was happening. A few minutes later she was rinsing the tooth with cold water and I FELT THAT COLD TOO!!!!!

I started crying I was so frustrated. Here I'd had shot after shot after shot and it wasn't working. And guess who's fault that is? Not the dental assistant, not even the dentist's. According to them, it WAS MY FAULT! It was all in my head and I was so stressed out I wasn't allowing myself to get numb.

Silly me, enjoying those jolts of cold wondering how close to a nerve she was. Silly me, enjoying shot after shot after shot into my GUMS! I was so mad. I was stressed, I don't enjoy these things. But folks, cold is cold! And I felt it! And I could feel my tongue press against my gums too even after she had supposedly numbed he whole quadrant of my mouth that tooth was in.

I was also getting my teeth cleaned while I was there so they decided to send me in to have that done and reschedule me to come back. They would prescribe a VALIUM for me to take the night before and the morning of my next appointment. Meanwhile comments about my state of mind and me making it worse than it had to be were thrown around. Livid. I was just absolutely livid.

The night before all of this I had gotten a piece of meat stuck in a gap I have. (It was created by the orthodontist for my braces a few years ago.) I know this is a gross but it is important. I had brushed and flossed and flossed and poked and I could not get it out. Yesterday morning I was going after it again and realized the dental hygienist would be able to get it out so I quite worrying about it.

Most of the "gap side" of my mouth was numb during the cleaning. That was a blessing I suppose. So, I couldn't feel her doing anything up there but assumed no dental oriented person would miss that. Right?

WRONG! After the anesthetic started wearing off, I could still feel the pressure of something up there. She had given me these little soft pick things as a sample so I used one of those and out it came. Again, I was so angry. What on earth??

So here is my dilemma. Almost every ounce of me wants to somewhere else, as much as I hate starting over and meeting new peeps when it comes to medical and dental persons. The only thing that makes me consider going back is that maybe this dentist would start out differently next time. Maybe go straight to the big guns, although those didn't seem to knock out the sensation. I'm not convinced the mild Valium will make that big of a difference either, and I won't be able to have the nitrous with the Valium.

I don't think the dentist is too questionable. I just didn't liked being blamed for it when I was already frustrated with not getting to have the work done after I had prepared myself for it.

So what would you do?? I'm torn and would love some input? I'd love some general anesthesia for this too but I suppose that isn't going to happen.