Numb for no reason
Comments (16) In celebration of having dental insurance, I made a slew of appointments for March and April. Three appointments, every other Friday – general check up, teeth cleaning, then filling some teeny tiny cavities.
Today was the final appointment, filling the cavities. A new (to me) dentist was working with me. He asked if I wanted to do the fillings on the top today and the bottom one at another time, so my whole face wouldn’t be numb. I let him I know I had been coming to their office every two weeks, and unless there was a risk to doing it all at once, I was fine with doing it all today so I wouldn’t have to come back.
I don’t mind the dentist. I am not freaked out and I like it when they clean my teeth. But I must admit, that when they prepared my gums to give me the shots (in three locations), I got a little bit anxious. And when they were giving the shots, I really wished my sister was there to hold my hand. Not that they hurt that much, but my sister took care of me when I had my (6!!!) wisdom teeth removed, and it was really comforting.
The dentist told me “I only put a little bit of anesthesia in the bottom, so when we are working on that one, you’ll have to let me know if it hurts.” Uh, great. He told me that, then left the room with his assistant to give me time to get numb. Of course, it was just time to think, ” how much will it hurt?”
I was sitting there, pondering the pain, and flipping through the stations on the ridiculously large but ridiculously slow plasma tv, when a different assistant came in the room.
She told me that my normal dentist doesn’t work there anymore (explains why I was seeing this new guy) and that he was the only “in-network” (or whatever they call it) dentist. So if I used this guy, today, it would cost more.
Uh. No thanks.
She was really apologetic, which I appreciated. And I told her it was no big deal, and made an appointment for May 15* when the other in-network dentist comes back from maternity leave.
I would rather use an in-network dentist and save myself the money, especially since these cavities are so small and probably don’t even need to be filled. Thank heavens she caught it before they started working on me.
But now I have a numb face, and for nothing. I just tried to drink some water… yeah, that was amusing. And I’m super hungry, but I am not sure if I should eat anything? Ha ha. Maybe this numbness will help me relax!
*Sister, will you come hold my hand?
Themocracy