I had my big dentist appointment this week. The big appointment is when I not only have a cleaning with the hygienist, but I also have to do x-rays and see the dentist as well. I hate these big appointments because I always think that something is going to be horribly wrong and I’ll be told that if I don’t fix something ASAP my teeth will fall out.
I know it seems crazy to think that, but so many of these appointments have ended in the past with me scheduling more appointments for major dental work. I’ve had more fillings, crowns, and shots than anybody would ever want in their life. And I know that there will eventually be more major dental work in my future because all the work that was done previously won’t last forever. Many things will need to be repaired or replaced one day. I’ve already had to have one crown cemented down again. And while that wasn’t that extreme of an appointment, it was still pretty painful for me.
The panic meds I’ve been taking for years have helped a bit. And even when I had my last cleaning and was dealing with Vyvanse plus my panic meds wasn’t too bad. But the combination of the double appointment plus the Vyvanse was not that great.
The night before the appointment, I couldn’t sleep. I have had tooth nightmares for several nights leading up to the appointment and knew that I would have another nightmare that night as well. I woke up exhausted and tried my best to time out my medications. I took my morning Vyvanse plus a painkiller (I figured that some pain relief couldn’t hurt). I’m lucky that my increased dosage of Vyvanse is split so I only had one dose prior to my dentist appointment. But I still had more panic than before.
Whenever I have these double appointments, I always try to schedule my cleaning first. That way, the hygienist can give me a heads up if something looks suspicious to her. She didn’t see anything so I moved on to the next chair for the x-rays.
X-rays aren’t painful, but they aren’t that fun for me either. I always look at the screen when the x-rays come up and try to see what they might show (I have no clue how to read dental x-rays so looking at them doesn’t do me any good). Once the dentist took a look at my x-rays, he gave me a clean bill of tooth health. Nothing is looking like a cavity (or pre-cavity), all my fillings look good and don’t need to be crowns yet, and all my crowns are secure and aren’t causing me any extra tooth sensitivity.
As soon as I was done paying, I got out of the office. I don’t like being there because I still have memories of bad appointments in the past. Even after I have a good appointment, I start thinking about the next one and get scared that in 4 months I will have something wrong.
I wish I could just outgrow this fear. I’m aware that it’s silly and I haven’t had a bad appointment in a while. But I don’t want to be comfortable either because I know that my panic makes me take better care of my teeth than many people do.
I’m just glad that I survived another dentist appointment and had nothing wrong. And I was able to schedule a couple of things to be right after the dentist appointment so I didn’t have to think about it too long after the appointment ended. I was too busy focusing on everything else (and all the good stuff) happening in my life.
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