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Why I Fear Dental Offices

G

GlitchyRed02

Junior member
Joined
Jan 21, 2021
Messages
1
Location
NY
The reasoning behind my fear of dental offices in general is because of multiple bad experiences that I’ve experienced. For example, when I had a root canal done around maybe 4 or 5 years ago, they put the wrong size crown on the root canal tooth but did nothing to fix it. It took me 4 or 5 years just to find a new dental place near where I live and they were the ones who took notice to the fact that the last dentist had put the wrong sized crown on. On top of that, the post didn’t reach to the bottom of the root of that tooth like it should have. Even worse was a temporary filling was put in when I had to have that root canal be redone, only for the dentist to never replace the temporary filling. So for two years, I had a hole taking up the middle of the top of the tooth that was progressively getting deeper into the tooth as the temporary filling was wearing away.

As if it weren’t bad enough, the dentist knew I had a hole in my tooth. But what did they say? “Oh, we’re just keeping an eye on it.” Yeah, as the hole kept progressively getting deeper and they did nothing whatsoever to even attempt to fix the hole. And then I had a root canal done on the tooth next to that one. Let’s just say that according to my new dentist, my last dentist used a post that was larger than what would typically be used for a tooth that size. To sum it up, I was told if that tooth gets infected, I’ll either need to get the root canal done completely again which would be no easy task due to the single rooted tooth having split into two roots at the bottom of the root, or my other option would be to have the tooth be pulled out entirely.

As if my last dentist hadn’t already done a not so great job, when they put braces on me, the braces ended up doing more harm than good in the sense that it caused me to get cavities in places directly behind the brackets where I physically could not have been able to reach with the tooth brush. Let’s just say I’m glad my teeth straightened out seven months early because the braces alone left me with around fourteen or fifteen cavities and almost made me lose six adult teeth at around age 16. A majority of those teeth would have been highly noticeable if I had ended up losing them.

Then whenever they had to fill cavities, they literally never used enough Novocain in the sense that they always presumed that only one injection of Novocain would be enough for them to do a removal of a deep cavity. And sometimes, they wouldn’t even use Novocain to begin with. Instead, they occasionally would have just sprayed cold water on the tooth to act as sort of a numbing thing saying I didn’t really need Novocain to get surface cavities removed, but all that ended up doing for me was causing those teeth to permanently become extremely sensitive to cold liquids. So, I’ve got one half of my mouth being extremely sensitive to cold liquids and the other half of my mouth is extremely sensitive to sweets. I cannot comfortably have sweets or cold liquids without fearing that it’ll cause me severe discomfort that could last for up to ten or fifteen minutes. At this point, I’ve almost given up on eating anything sugary like candy because it’s not worth the discomfort. Just like I can’t drink iced drinks without it causing a severe throbbing pain that’s harsh enough that it causes me to put my hand over my mouth in pain because of the cold touching the areas where surface cavities got removed.

And anytime they actually did use Novocain when it was truly needed, they could have been more gentle with actually injecting it. I’ve met dentists that quite literally made me barely even feel the needle but when my last dentist did the injection, it felt like a needle-sharp pinprick that honestly brought a rather high level of discomfort.

If that wasn’t bad enough, the tooth that had the incorrect sized crown with the only around half sized post in it with a hole in the top of the crown, the gums around that tooth have gotten infected once or twice to the point I had to squeeze the infection out to make my mouth feel comfortable again even if it wasn’t too badly infected, seeing as there was no swelling whatsoever and it was only a tiny bit of pus.

Even though it’s been two years since I last went to my old dentist and I just got a new dentist a few days ago, I’m still awaiting an appointment to get the crown taken off and the post taken out then replaced with a proper post and a properly fitting crown. Then I also have to schedule to get my wisdom teeth removed and fix the nineteen cavities I currently have; which a lot of them are formed deep underneath multiple old fillings which a majority of those original fillings were from when I needed to get my teeth fixed after what my braces did to them.

On top of that, if you want a comparison of how deep the hole in the tooth is, let’s just say an entire kernel of corn can fit in it easily and that after every snack or meal I have, I have to very carefully pull chunks of food out of the hole so that it relieves the discomfort caused by having food get stuck in the hole.I don’t need to check in a mirror to tell if food is stuck in the hole. It causes me a physical discomfort if there is something stuck in the hole that shouldn’t be there and the discomfort will not leave until the stuck material gets removed which would relieve the pain of the pressure.

And on the tooth next to it that had the other root canal, it looks like there’s either a tiny scratch or a crack in the top of the crown that’s really only noticeable if you look at it from a particular angle. Though, the only tooth that truly bothers me once in a while is the troubled root canal tooth. But I think this is enough ranting about my experiences for one day.
 
wow and i always thought my dentist where BAD as in '' dont worry i wont pull your tooth out.'' and ten mins later it turns out he had pulled my tooth out. i went crazy.

i really hope that the new person you are seeing is better and gives you the treatment you need. you are braver than me . i will no longer step foot inside a dentist and am looking at home fixes that are safe. wishing you all the luck in the world :)
 
Even though I go regularly, I am scared the dentist pull all my teeth out, even though I like my dentist and assistant.

The only thing I like about the dentist practice is the smells when I walk in.

My dentist shows me her drawer of chocolates
 
Needles. I've fought hard to overcome my fear, but still jump at the phlebotomist. I apologize before hand and tell them it's a reflex I've never mastered.

I cannot shake that fear with needles into my gums. It's so close to the bone and it hurts so bad until I'm numb.

I used to pass out getting blood work. That's under control but my whole arm goes numb the moment novocain hits my gums.

Add, I've had dentists pull out fillings and claim they were plaque deposits. Sorry but I was there when said plaque deposit was molded onto my tooth. I know the difference between plaque and a porcelain filling.

I had a very rude denturist huff and refuse to do the procedure after I could feel everything she was doing post novocain and she refused to numb me further.

This time I want IV sedation. One needle prick, into my hand or arm and wake up after it's done. I can't handle anything else.
 
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