TO PLANT OR NOT TO IMPLANT?
‘my personal journey into Mexico for my dental work’
The sound and feel of the dentist drilling into my tooth was to much to bear and I ended up BITING HIS HAND! He sent me home with out finishing and eventually I had the tooth pulled. My mom was not impressed ...I was 9 years old and didn’t care.
.....and so began my journey to being toothless ...well I am exaggerating, but when pull came against drill... I had them pulled every time , now have bridges ....just another bridge to cross when dealing with my teeth. Well that is until one bridge broke off. I had so many teeth pulled (they didn’t have ipods back then to drown out the drilling) that I was running out of teeth to attach the bridges to.
So here I am in Mexico ,where I had my original two bridges done four years ago by a young dentist that I went to interview and see if I felt comfortable with him. He managed to gain my trust ...well.... his wife worked there too and she held my hand while I cried. Yes I am exaggerating... but I do cry ...well my eyes are like water buckets and I feel like I am going to die when lying back in that chair ...and yes she did hold my hand, and sure, I recede back into childhood when I enter a dentist office.
He did a lot of work in my mouth back then (putting in two bridges) and now he was scolding me for not having my teeth cleaned twice a year! Are you KIDDING me???? GO IN TWICE A YEAR to a dentist office!!! OMG ...willingly...Jesus .... Poor tooth took either too much of a beating in four years or it was not cleaned properly and it decayed under cap (bridge ) and broke off (second excuse is likely cause). It abscessed over xmas and I was in my own special hell.
Sooooo ....this is my third trip to Mexico in as many weeks ...antibiotic regime for abscessed broken off tooth is taking it’s time to heal. So far I have not bought a Micheal Koors purse and have resisted all the silver jewelry ...well except for this one little ring ...ahhhh. Oh ..and...and...two metal flower sculptures that are absolutely stunning and will look great on our buffet tables (in the catering business) as centerpieces (and easy for our artistically challenged staff to put out with out too much effort......and you know who you are... : )
....and in the end the problem tooth has a fracture and cannot be saved ...hmmmm ..dam... that teeth cleaning twice a year maybe wouldn’t have been so bad. My favorite and gentle dentist ‘Dr. Arturo’ has suggested two implants , one going into hole made by problem tooth being extracted and another by my back molar, seems you can’t attach a bridge to a ‘live ‘ tooth and an implant. So off I go for a CAT scan to see if I have enough bone for second implant.
Back home we have a waiting list to get a CT scan done...here I go next door and pay 75.00 cash and have it done right away. I should also mention that I have had so many xrays (digital) taken of my head that my friend says I’m going to grow another head and I reply ‘oh great...then I’ll have TWO mouths to feed!’
All the xrays are free and I don’t see lots of big beautiful offices here in Mexico (they are clean, small and efficient). They do have a lot of assistant's that are in training and also dentists that are dedicated root canal specialists , and I really like that! I have had two root canals this visit and the female dentist was so gentle , thorough and fast that I wanted to hug her forever when she finished....I hardly felt a thing and she was nudging me telling me it was done...really ! Mexico also has travelling root canal specialists ! They come to the dentist office and do it right there on the spot ...had two done four years ago ...they know their stuff and make having a root canal not so bad.
Ok... so root canals notwithstanding , I still have that inner turmoil that will never go away when visiting a dentists office. The implants are not on my agenda and in the end all the stress and turmoil won out and I only got one implant...two root canals and a three tooth bridge, one crown on the bottom molar, that was the other anchor for the bridge that broke off. Bottom bridge that broke off... will stay off... and I am FINISHED.... with one implant in and healing.
Total cost is less than 3,000.00
The removal of problem tooth and subsequent implant is painless and fast ..an hour and a half! Dr. Arturo really knows his stuff and he is very gentle with me and god knows how I appreciate that! I fill his prescription for yet another round of antibiotic's and narcotic? for pain and swelling that mysteriously does not appear. The implant site is not even swollen!
So moral of the story is ’FOR CHRISTS SAKE DON’T BITE THE DENTISTS HAND WHEN YOU ARE A KID’.... get your teeth cleaned regular...uh huh (and I WILL be doing that at least once a year...so ok ...we need to compromise here) I only come down here once a year, .and although I don’t cry , and don’t need my hand held anymore, when I am sitting in that dentist chair with my head back...... I still feel like I AM GONNA DIE!!
end of story
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