Nurse the Hate: Hate the Dentist

As I wait here at the drug store for my pain meds, I can't help but marvel at the absurdity of willingly driving across town to have a relative stranger drill into my jaw with a drill.  I have put myself into this situation.  I initiated the situation I find myself in right now.  I could have avoided it.  Yet, I hopped in my car and drove over to a nondescript office building to be manhandled by a stranger.  I will pay this stranger thousands of dollars to perform a procedure that I don't understand or frankly have any real idea if he actually completed.  I don’t know what happened down there.  All I know is that I sat in a chair with a woman putting suction devices in my mouth while this man drilled into me with nightmarish instruments while I squinted into the blinding light hoping it would end soon.  

I had a good run with dentists for most of my adult life until the last five years or so when I began with cracking a molar, which then became crowns of various substances, until finally I cracked the root of the tooth itself.  This has, of course, led to a continuing string of related issues all of which lead me back into the dentist chair.  I have a superhuman resistance to Novocain which always plays out the same way.  Step one is I get the first series of Novocain shots.  50% of the time a nerve is struck in my lower jaw and the pale blue electric shock jolts me in what is referred to in the industry as "momentary discomfort".  My less schooled friends would refer to this sensation as "hurting like a motherfucker", but every peer group has their own particular language.  The doctor then says "you should be numb now, so let's get started".  I then say "I'm still pretty tingly."  He thinks I don’t know what I am talking about and begins drilling into me with some horribly effective device at which point I say something to alert him like "Holy mother of fuck!".  As I have a host of tubes and clamps in my mouth this comes out as “Mooway muffa a fuh!”.  There is then confusion as he attempts to understand why I am writhing around like an angry otter on a slip n slide.

When I was in college I went to a dentist that I chose based on cost.  This is a mistake.  One should never scrimp on shoes, cheese, and as I learned, medical care.  I went in to get a cavity filled, but that situation soon denigrated into a dozen Novocain shots and the dentist accusing me of being a cocaine addict.  “I have never seen someone so unaffected by Novocain.  You must do a lot of cocaine!  Why don’t you just admit it!”.  I had never even seen cocaine unless you count all the coke everyone in the 70s rock documentary “The Last Waltz” was doing apparently 13 seconds before every scene was shot.  For whatever reason, Novocain just works very slowly on me.  At this particular appointment I had to choose between having a shot directly into my cavity (which seemed like a horrible idea) or bracing me for the“discomfort” for what he promised was ten seconds.  I chose the latter.

Let me tell you with great authority that ten seconds of having an exposed nerve drilled are a longer ten seconds than that spent sky diving or being fellated by a Kardashian sister.  Time is funny that way.  Those ten seconds of being drilled was at least 17 minutes, though I did not own a watch at that time and cannot confirm it.  It lasted forever.  When it was over, the cold sweat and involuntary tears on the corners of my eyes made me feel like a real sissy boy.  Being yelled at unjustly for being a coke addict while in the prone position didn’t help either.  I slunk out of the office with an entirely numb face and crushed spirit.  It forever changed how I felt about going to the dentist.

Today’s experience went as usual with the drilling starting prior to my being numb.  I also enjoyed the initial Novocain shot striking a nerve and popping that electric pain charge across my lower teeth like I put my tongue into a socket.  Eventually the 17 shots did take effect and my face felt like wax.  I am convinced I have drool running down my immobile lip.  I will probably chew the edge of my tongue off by accident waiting for this to wear off.  Then again I am filled with fear that the Novocain will wear off and I am left with a pain that turns me into a snarling animal.  I have been given some sort of discount pain killer prescription, but I know those will either be ineffective or too effective.  It will be like I took nothing or I will pass out and wet myself in my car.  This whole thing has gone poorly.