Dental Health is my Top Priority
December 11th, 2008I Even Bought an Opener for Beer Bottles
I just got back from my semi-annual dental checkup. Everything is swell, except one of my old metal fillings is not looking too good. It’s going to be gouged out and replaced. Fun.
I told the doctor it was about forty years old, but he wasn’t buying it. I am pretty sure it went in there under the Nixon administration. I was thinking about it on the way home. My mother loved me and all, but I believe I am correct when I say I did not go to the dentist between my teens and thirties. I think she quit taking me when I was in high school. I had a few cavities as a kid, and then when I returned to the dentist in the Nineties, I apparently had some little things called “pits,” which are not really full-blown cavities, yet which are profitable to fill. So they got filled. That’s about it. The Nineties fillings are composite, so anything metallic has to be ancient. They always say metal fillings don’t last, but I am older than dirt, and this is the first time one has shown signs of failure.
Since things went so well, I am celebrating. With a bag of Krispy Kreme mini-crullers. They’re not that good, I know, but I felt I had to make a statement, and the store didn’t have the little cherry Entenmann’s hand pies I wanted. I think I’ll put Quik on them. My teeth have been deprived of their protective layer of tartar, so I need to build it back up.
The store had rib roasts on sale for $6 a pound. Is that even fair? How am I supposed to not buy that? I always check the price, but I count on them not to put them on sale. We have an unspoken agreement. Now they have gone and violated it.
I better go get the Quik.
December 11th, 2008 at 1:21 PM
It’s taken me about 10 years to repair/replace a childhood of welfare dentistry.
Now, braces, crowns and grafting.
I have 3 dental specialists now that I visit regularly…..but it’s all worth it. Dental health is very important to overall health so good for you.
Now I’m waiting for it all to get done so I can lose some teeth in a freak kickboxing accident………
December 11th, 2008 at 2:05 PM
(Sorry to be a KIA.)
Tartar isn’t caused by sugar/carbs, but by calcium in saliva. It doesn’t corrode teeth, but it gives bacteria a nice coral reef of sorts to set up colonies and start to work unraveling the structure of teeth with acid secretions.
Some people seem to accumulate more tartar than others. I saw a lot less when I went on a years-long avoidance of dairy products.
A soft-bristle brush pointed at the gumline and pressed just strong enough to move the feathery edge of the gum aside, should be all one needs to dislodge tartar. I brush for a solid 10 minutes (usually watching TV), and my hygienist complains I don’t give her enough to work on.
That’s with a non-tartar-control toothpaste, BTW. The chemicals in that stuff were too harsh for me.
Congratulations on a good checkup. Amalgam fillings do have a lifespan, but if they’re sculpted well it can be decades.
December 11th, 2008 at 2:26 PM
I would get Bosco if I were you. You are already in for several hundred hams this winter…
December 11th, 2008 at 4:11 PM
I got several old metal filings back in the 1970s. They started to fail in the late 90s. A few are still in there.
December 11th, 2008 at 6:39 PM
What Wormathan said.
Do you really want C. Walken’s attention right now? Remember what happened last time you were caught sporting a non-Bosco product?
December 11th, 2008 at 10:42 PM
Winn-Dixie is South Florida’s “Piggly-Wiggly.” Are they even allowed to sell rib roasts there? Did they fall off the truck heading to Norman Brothers or Fresh Market? Sorry, I know you love that store for meats . . . but, we only used to end up there on Sundays when Publix used to be closed (I am officially a dinosaur). It always had that oh, not so fresh smell to it. And, the smell and dirt isn’t that unique to the South Miami store. I think they pipe that odor and silt into their new “MarketPlaces” as well.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:51 PM
SondraK: don’t feel bad, it’s not just “welfare dentists”. I went to highly recommended specialists for the first 37 years of my life, and just spent the last 12 years ripping out their handiwork and replacing it.
I went from painful sensitivity and visible metal fillings to a completely white mouth and absolutely no sensitivity to hot or cold or pressure. The right dentist is worth more than his weight in gold (but don’t tell him, or he might demand a raise).
December 12th, 2008 at 3:33 AM
Have you checked out Meathenge?
December 12th, 2008 at 9:59 AM
I went to Publix for some reason that now escapes me. And fittingly, I left my pistol in the car. I take it out of my pocket when I go to the dentist, because it would hang out while I lie in the chair.