Tech-NOT-logy

To my surprise, not everything in this blog will be about talking to the other side, apparently. Sometimes it will be about other experiences I have endured, like this past week. I had to have a tooth pulled.

Can someone please explain to me WHY, OH, WHY can we put a man on the moon, yet we are still medievally barbaric when it comes to pulling out a tooth?

I had a tooth that had had a root canal and a crown, yet it continued to be sensitive. The dentist(s) who performed said procedures assured me that a tooth can stay sensitive for a while afterward, I'd just have to wait. Fine, I waited. Until it became infected and I had to do a round of antibiotics. It was looked at and nothing was found to be wrong. I waited again. Until it became infected again. Another round of antibiotics. Another exam. Another pronouncement of nothing wrong. And so on. For two years. It was nearing the point of being on antibiotics daily to keep the infection from spreading.

Now, realize each exam, prescription, exam, etc., cost money. My choice became have it out, or 'go in and see what is going on'. Exploratory surgery as it were, on a tooth. The cost of which was close to what it would cost to purchase a small country. I opted to have it out.

Having had a string of consistently BAD dental experiences, I am now at the point where I need to take Valium before anything is done. They had me wait until I'd signed the paperwork, so I wouldn't be impaired during signing. Fine. I signed, swallowed the pill and climbed into the chair to get the numbing injections that hurt like heck. Then comes the new age tech-NOT-logy part.

The dentist takes a shiny little shovel like instrument and proceeds to SHOVE it up in between my gum and the tooth, once or twice on all four sides of the tooth, in order to loosen it. He then took a shiny little pliers looking thing, grabbed a hold of my tooth and started pulling, wiggling, yanking, and tugging. HARD! He and the dental assistant both kept reassuring me that I was doing well as I arched up out of the chair and tried to find enough traction on the smooth leather seat to kick one of them in the head. I also tried to say something intelligent, like 'F$%@ YOU!', but with the shiny little pliers in my mouth and the haze of pain, I could only moan pitifully.

It would have been over at that point, but the tooth then broke, leaving all 3 roots still embedded in my head. Sir DDS (he might have downed a crock of Beowulf's mead at this point, not sure, I could have been hallucinating that part) then did the same new-age, shovel-shoving, tooth loosening technique on each of the 3 roots, grabbed each one and maliciously yanked each out, ALL of which, I swear, were conected to my EYEBALL and BRAINSTEM. I know there was 'gray matter' on the end of one root.

It's amazing, is it not, that a society so tooth technology stunted can continue to advance so rapidly in other areas?

Peace, love and light,
LaSal