S
SpongeBob
Junior member
- Joined
- Sep 26, 2017
- Messages
- 4
I guess I will begin by how I got here. When I was just eight years old I had a tooth extracted and it shook my mum up so much that she never took me back. I took care of my own teeth by brushing then, flossing etc but that was it. When I was old enough to go myself the fear was inbuilt. At aged 21 my daughter died and I stopped caring for myself, depression and punishing myself I guess. I stopped brushing my teeth too. Over the next seven years I had sixteen miscarriages and buried another daughter. My self hatred was at an all time high.
I managed to bring home a baby and keep him and slowly but surely I've built myself up to a level of semi liking myself again. I want to go to university and study to become a healthcare professional, to help like me. But my teeth are hindering me. I hate to talk. Hate to smile. They're preventing me healing further.
Until recently I had been twice since I was eight (i am 32), both to the same dentist. I had an abbcess both times (same place) and the fear meant I could barely open my mouth. He promised to send me some where else, a referral to where I could be sedated. That was ten years ago and never happened. In the mean time my teeth got worse and worse.
I made a decision to go to the dentist about a month ago. I searched out a nervous patient dentist, one that offered sedation. I went to my first appointment and she was amazing. Part of my fear was afraid of judgement too. She hasn't to my face at least and said at least my teeth aren't hurting me.
The first appointment she just did X-rays and made notes of where I needed fillings etc. This helped me massively as I realised they didn't just cause pain.
A week later I went back as they were suppose to do the teeth mould for a denture but it was too late as the man had collected the things already. So she numbed me, three injection in the top and two in the bottom. Even my eye lids were numb. I hated that feeling. They did nine fillings in total. All composite. The front ones make my bottom teeth look so much better. The rest were all at the back. The cleaning I hate. It is awful. The vibration send my anxiety through the roof.
Any way, one of my filling between my two front teeth fell out the very next day. I was gutted. A week after and I went back for the cast to be made. That made me gag. They also did the filling.
I finally went back for my extraction of six front teeth today and the people who make them had messed up and they had only put canines on the denture. So a wasted day in some ways. However I saw the denture and it has relieved some of my fears. It's not a huge chunk of plastic and the two teeth did look natural.
That brings me to now. My fear is far from nothing, each time I go it's traumatic for me but I'm so proud of how far I've come. I've still got a way to go, extraction and probably a few more fillings but I really hope that soon I'm able to order in a restaurant without feeling ashamed or ask my husband to.
I managed to bring home a baby and keep him and slowly but surely I've built myself up to a level of semi liking myself again. I want to go to university and study to become a healthcare professional, to help like me. But my teeth are hindering me. I hate to talk. Hate to smile. They're preventing me healing further.
Until recently I had been twice since I was eight (i am 32), both to the same dentist. I had an abbcess both times (same place) and the fear meant I could barely open my mouth. He promised to send me some where else, a referral to where I could be sedated. That was ten years ago and never happened. In the mean time my teeth got worse and worse.
I made a decision to go to the dentist about a month ago. I searched out a nervous patient dentist, one that offered sedation. I went to my first appointment and she was amazing. Part of my fear was afraid of judgement too. She hasn't to my face at least and said at least my teeth aren't hurting me.
The first appointment she just did X-rays and made notes of where I needed fillings etc. This helped me massively as I realised they didn't just cause pain.
A week later I went back as they were suppose to do the teeth mould for a denture but it was too late as the man had collected the things already. So she numbed me, three injection in the top and two in the bottom. Even my eye lids were numb. I hated that feeling. They did nine fillings in total. All composite. The front ones make my bottom teeth look so much better. The rest were all at the back. The cleaning I hate. It is awful. The vibration send my anxiety through the roof.
Any way, one of my filling between my two front teeth fell out the very next day. I was gutted. A week after and I went back for the cast to be made. That made me gag. They also did the filling.
I finally went back for my extraction of six front teeth today and the people who make them had messed up and they had only put canines on the denture. So a wasted day in some ways. However I saw the denture and it has relieved some of my fears. It's not a huge chunk of plastic and the two teeth did look natural.
That brings me to now. My fear is far from nothing, each time I go it's traumatic for me but I'm so proud of how far I've come. I've still got a way to go, extraction and probably a few more fillings but I really hope that soon I'm able to order in a restaurant without feeling ashamed or ask my husband to.