PAIN AND AGONY

Easter was a wonderful day. After Church we took my Aunt Happy out to the Black Angus for Easter dinner. The Black Angus was one of her and Uncle Don’s favorite restaurants when Uncle Don was still alive and I think she really enjoyed reliving some memories of those times.

She is slowing down somewhat – not her mind but her body. Mainly her balance isn’t as good as it used to be. She fell out of bed a couple of times and couldn’t get herself back into bed. So she now has a hospital type bed and seems to love it. It keeps her low enough to the ground so if she does fall out she won’t get hurt and she can climb back in again. Still amazing for being almost 98.

Monday, I finally bit the bullet. I have had a tooth ache for the last week and a half. You need to realize how much I hate going to the dentist. One of those really irrational fears. But I didn’t have any choice. I couldn’t stand the pain any longer.

Being a retired Federal employee, our dental insurance is really lousy but I figure every penny helps. I went to the Blue Cross website,  found a list of providers in Apache Junction and picked the first one on the list. Remember, I’m desperate at this time.

They were able to get me in at 1:45. Jim dropped me off (coward that he is for not going in with me) and said call me when you’re done. I filled out all the paperwork and let me tell you – these were the nicest, friendliest group of people I have ever dealt with in a doctor or dentist’s office. Really amazing customer service.

Climbed into the dentist chair – trying to be brave. Lori took a couple of X-rays and it didn’t even hurt. Boy, have they really improved that procedure. I used to hate those big things they stick in your mouth and then tell you to bite down when you can’t because the x-ray thingie is so huge. These new ones actually fit in your mouth.

She and I both looked at the x-rays and things are not looking good at all. She goes out and in comes Dr. Trevor Caffall. He looks like he’s about 12 years old. Not really, but he’s young. He looks at the X-rays, taps on my teeth, pokes around in my mouth and then looks at me and says – “I can’t find anything wrong.” The X-rays show absolutely no signs of any cavities or infections or anything that could be causing my pain.

At this point, I want to do nothing but cry. I can’t live with this pain anymore. Dr. Trevor does some singing along with the oldies music that is playing (really oldies for him) and some thinking, and tries a few other pokings and tappings. He then tells me that all he can do is make an educated guess and there are two things that could be the problem.

1. I could have a sinus infection which is causing the pain to show up in my teeth. However, this is not likely. It really doesn’t show up in the X-rays and I don’t feel like I have any allergy type issues. He had me bend forward while standing and shake my head really hard. The pain didn’t get any worse so we ruled this one out.

2. I may have bitten down onto something really hard and stretched the ligaments that hold my tooth into place. I should also tell you, that tooth is an anchor for a bridge. The ligaments are inflamed and the tooth has no where to go but to push upwards and that makes my bite misaligned. Dr. Trevor ground down the tooth and told me to give it a couple of days to see if the pain eases.

If this doesn’t work, we really aren’t sure what we will be doing. Please, please, please let this work.

I was really impressed with Canyon Vista Dental Center here in Apache Junction. I do know that if we ever need a dentist in this area, this is definitely where we will go.