C
clevernickname
Junior member
- Joined
- Nov 14, 2008
- Messages
- 2
I have had a fear of dentists since I was little, and I’m going to see one next week.
My story is probably like many of yours, as a child I had a dentist that kept going when pain medication wasn’t working and he didn’t do a good job and I needed to go back for filling replacements, with rounds of pain, agony, blame, and depression.
A few years ago (like 8 or 10) I was eating food which contained a piece of metal. This broke a right upper tooth (third from back). And the all-the-way-back upper-right tooth is very broken as well (from the childhood bad dentist’s numerous fillings). I spent years fashioning my own fillings for these holes out of dentemp and other hardening tools. After thoroughly cleaning the area (and drinking lots of scotch) Anbesol or clove soaked tissue paper would be typically sealed in to help with pain.
For some reason, I had no problems digging around in my own mouth. Blood running down my own arm was fine. But people at the movies talking about going to the dentist made me run out of the movie and go hide in the car. I can’t deal with any visions or depictions of teeth.
My best friend from high school went on to dental school and I can no longer talk to him.
I keep in my pockets my wallet, my keys, and a bottle of anbesol to help with the day-to-day pain. I keep anbesol on my desk at work, in the coffee table at home, and in every medicine cabinet in the house.
After the years of pain, my wife talked me into seeing a dentist. This was over three years ago now. That did not go well at all. They basically belittled me for having a fear and to, “Be a man.”
This brought on another year or more of fear with the pain.
Again, my wife pressed me to see a dentist and I saw one who was initially okay. He sent me to an endodontist for a root canal of the tooth broken by the metal years before. I think I nearly broke my fingers holding on in fear. I don’t know how I got through that, I think the days without sleep due to agony helped. But when I went back to the regular dentist then he promised he’d prescribe drugs that I could take before coming back to get the post/crown work down.
Fine. But he phoned it in to the wrong pharmacy. And then his staff refused to correct this mistake. They said I had to sort it out, but I didn’t even know whom they phoned or if they ever really phoned anyone in the first place. I originally supplied them with the phone number and address of my pharmacy that said they never got an order and the dentist refused to phone in another incase I was some “drug addict” using them for pills.
Yeah, because it’s so much easier to fake paranoia to get pills than to buy them on the corner – thanks, guys. No, instead let’s make it stressful to get the pills to relieve stress. It was like force-feeding peanut butter to someone with a peanut allergy.
Great, no respect, traumatic phone calls, insults, and back to hiding in the closet and crying in fear. Literally, I would hide myself in my bedroom closet for hours keeping out everyone except if the cat meowed and wanted in.
But, I still have the tooth with just the root canal. No post. No crown. And the back-most upper-right tooth that’s still holier than the Pope. Been this way now for just over two years.
And now, for whatever reason, I asked my wife to find me another dentist to try. She’s scheduled me for an initial appointment on Friday of next week. It is a week away and I haven’t slept in the past two nights since she’s made the appointment. It is now after 1AM as I write this in my time zone and it looks like I’m in for another long night.
I keep getting visions of the pick going in my mouth and I just shut down. I can’t go to sleep since when I try to relax the visions come. I can focus on my work or editing family photos to try and distract myself, but it is now a struggle to make anything decent come from my efforts due to the exhaustion. Yet, the terrifying visions still haunt me.
I can’t go to the bathroom without my mind seeing things. I can’t watch TV for fear that a toothpaste commercial will come on, and I’d be lying if I said that suicidal thoughts haven’t crept in once or twice. No, I’m not seriously thinking about it – I’m just strung out and I’m of sound mind enough to know that. But, that’s how scared I am right now.
I wish life worked more like the A-Team. Remember when Mr. T had to fly, but he feared it, and the rest of the team would drug him? He’d wake up not knowing it ever happened. Why can’t someone hit me with a drugged dart and I’d just wake up days later with new teeth? I have no problems with drugs: I love them and I have insurance. I just have problems finding someone who will give them to me, and the courage to ask for help in the first place.
I’m terrified, I’m scared, I’m weeping, and this is the first time outside of my immediate family I’ve talked openly about my situation.
Anyone know how I can try and make it through the next 24 hours and into the weekend where I can just hide in my closet for two days????
My story is probably like many of yours, as a child I had a dentist that kept going when pain medication wasn’t working and he didn’t do a good job and I needed to go back for filling replacements, with rounds of pain, agony, blame, and depression.
A few years ago (like 8 or 10) I was eating food which contained a piece of metal. This broke a right upper tooth (third from back). And the all-the-way-back upper-right tooth is very broken as well (from the childhood bad dentist’s numerous fillings). I spent years fashioning my own fillings for these holes out of dentemp and other hardening tools. After thoroughly cleaning the area (and drinking lots of scotch) Anbesol or clove soaked tissue paper would be typically sealed in to help with pain.
For some reason, I had no problems digging around in my own mouth. Blood running down my own arm was fine. But people at the movies talking about going to the dentist made me run out of the movie and go hide in the car. I can’t deal with any visions or depictions of teeth.
My best friend from high school went on to dental school and I can no longer talk to him.
I keep in my pockets my wallet, my keys, and a bottle of anbesol to help with the day-to-day pain. I keep anbesol on my desk at work, in the coffee table at home, and in every medicine cabinet in the house.
After the years of pain, my wife talked me into seeing a dentist. This was over three years ago now. That did not go well at all. They basically belittled me for having a fear and to, “Be a man.”
This brought on another year or more of fear with the pain.
Again, my wife pressed me to see a dentist and I saw one who was initially okay. He sent me to an endodontist for a root canal of the tooth broken by the metal years before. I think I nearly broke my fingers holding on in fear. I don’t know how I got through that, I think the days without sleep due to agony helped. But when I went back to the regular dentist then he promised he’d prescribe drugs that I could take before coming back to get the post/crown work down.
Fine. But he phoned it in to the wrong pharmacy. And then his staff refused to correct this mistake. They said I had to sort it out, but I didn’t even know whom they phoned or if they ever really phoned anyone in the first place. I originally supplied them with the phone number and address of my pharmacy that said they never got an order and the dentist refused to phone in another incase I was some “drug addict” using them for pills.
Yeah, because it’s so much easier to fake paranoia to get pills than to buy them on the corner – thanks, guys. No, instead let’s make it stressful to get the pills to relieve stress. It was like force-feeding peanut butter to someone with a peanut allergy.
Great, no respect, traumatic phone calls, insults, and back to hiding in the closet and crying in fear. Literally, I would hide myself in my bedroom closet for hours keeping out everyone except if the cat meowed and wanted in.
But, I still have the tooth with just the root canal. No post. No crown. And the back-most upper-right tooth that’s still holier than the Pope. Been this way now for just over two years.
And now, for whatever reason, I asked my wife to find me another dentist to try. She’s scheduled me for an initial appointment on Friday of next week. It is a week away and I haven’t slept in the past two nights since she’s made the appointment. It is now after 1AM as I write this in my time zone and it looks like I’m in for another long night.
I keep getting visions of the pick going in my mouth and I just shut down. I can’t go to sleep since when I try to relax the visions come. I can focus on my work or editing family photos to try and distract myself, but it is now a struggle to make anything decent come from my efforts due to the exhaustion. Yet, the terrifying visions still haunt me.
I can’t go to the bathroom without my mind seeing things. I can’t watch TV for fear that a toothpaste commercial will come on, and I’d be lying if I said that suicidal thoughts haven’t crept in once or twice. No, I’m not seriously thinking about it – I’m just strung out and I’m of sound mind enough to know that. But, that’s how scared I am right now.
I wish life worked more like the A-Team. Remember when Mr. T had to fly, but he feared it, and the rest of the team would drug him? He’d wake up not knowing it ever happened. Why can’t someone hit me with a drugged dart and I’d just wake up days later with new teeth? I have no problems with drugs: I love them and I have insurance. I just have problems finding someone who will give them to me, and the courage to ask for help in the first place.
I’m terrified, I’m scared, I’m weeping, and this is the first time outside of my immediate family I’ve talked openly about my situation.
Anyone know how I can try and make it through the next 24 hours and into the weekend where I can just hide in my closet for two days????