crown of creation
Nov. 30th, 2009 11:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calimacThe best kind of dental emergency may be one you don't even notice. It may have been months after it happened that the dental cleaning technician noticed I'd broken my back molar, and much scheduling, a quick exam, and more scheduling intervened before anything was to be done about it, during which I really didn't notice much that it was there.
Today was the dread occasion. The peculiar part of the job is not the painkilling but the process of calming the patient, who in this case is not frightened, but habitually rigid and uptight. In the past I had a dentist who was very free with use of nitrous oxide. This is interesting stuff. At first whiff, you panic, because you think you can't breathe, but after it takes over, you're completely detached. You just don't care about anything. You could be floating in Carl Sagan's imaginary chair, observing the universe, oblivious to that strange stuff going on immediately below your nose, which seems to belong to somebody else. After you get up, it passes quickly.
A fellow could get used to that sort of thing, so as someone with no desire to get attached to drugs recreationally, it was for the best that, when Dr. Whiff retired, my account was passed on to a dentist who doesn't believe in nitrous. Instead - and this is my second or third surgery with him - he orders me up a little pill which I take beforehand. Aside from slight wooziness, this pill has no conscious effect on me whatever, so I'm not likely to grow fond of it. It may, however, have been responsible for the 90 minutes in the chair to seem to whiz by. If I fell asleep for a while, all the better. (Not supposed to drive on the stuff, which increased the logistics problems of getting there.) Biting down on a rubber clamp keeps the mouth from closing. Two separate toothbaths in the yukky rubber mold seemed tolerable. When the novocaine wore off, the pain was tolerable. I guess the little pill did its job.
Today was the dread occasion. The peculiar part of the job is not the painkilling but the process of calming the patient, who in this case is not frightened, but habitually rigid and uptight. In the past I had a dentist who was very free with use of nitrous oxide. This is interesting stuff. At first whiff, you panic, because you think you can't breathe, but after it takes over, you're completely detached. You just don't care about anything. You could be floating in Carl Sagan's imaginary chair, observing the universe, oblivious to that strange stuff going on immediately below your nose, which seems to belong to somebody else. After you get up, it passes quickly.
A fellow could get used to that sort of thing, so as someone with no desire to get attached to drugs recreationally, it was for the best that, when Dr. Whiff retired, my account was passed on to a dentist who doesn't believe in nitrous. Instead - and this is my second or third surgery with him - he orders me up a little pill which I take beforehand. Aside from slight wooziness, this pill has no conscious effect on me whatever, so I'm not likely to grow fond of it. It may, however, have been responsible for the 90 minutes in the chair to seem to whiz by. If I fell asleep for a while, all the better. (Not supposed to drive on the stuff, which increased the logistics problems of getting there.) Biting down on a rubber clamp keeps the mouth from closing. Two separate toothbaths in the yukky rubber mold seemed tolerable. When the novocaine wore off, the pain was tolerable. I guess the little pill did its job.
no subject
Date: 2009-12-01 06:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-01 09:59 pm (UTC)