So what an interesting and enlightening day for me. I am less one tooth and plus more of an insight into myself. Usually I try and make my posts very light hearted so if you hate deep thoughts, just stop reading right now. And if you are continuing consider yourself forewarned... All weekend long I was dealing with a toothache. And part of the weekend I would say that the pain was bad enough to say that I was suffering from one. I knew that I would most likely need to go to the dentist and that was a really big thing for me to admit. You see, when I was 12 I had a bad experience at a vicious dentist and decided that enough was enough and just flat closed my mouth. And I did not open it for a dentist again until about 7 years ago when I was forced to go and have my upper wisdom teeth removed. About two years ago a filling fell out and I discovered that the metal filling that had caused me so much pain at 12 actually encompassed about 1/2 my tooth. So back in again I went and was given a temporary fillling and was told I should come back in a couple of weeks for a crown. Never went back and so far (knocking on wood here) the temp is still doing its job. But now I knew that the pain I felt was not in a throw away tooth. The kind that is buried deep back inside your mouth. I knew I needed to deal with this so today I headed off to a new dentist here in Texas. After an exam and xrays I was told that the tooth could certainly be saved- with a root canal and crown. I had the presense of mind to ask what this would cost after my insurance portion was paid. When the dental assistant came back in I was given two choices- save the tooth at the expense of $1100 out of pocket or take it out for $60. I knew it was up on top and in the back and I asked if anyone would be able to tell if I had it pulled out. They had me smile and I was told that most likely someone would only be able to see just the corner of it. They said to think about it for a moment and they would come back in. I realized that I was sitting there in the dental chair actually trying to figure out how I could pay for the $1100 to fix it. I was thinking about our rather meager savings that is being put away a few dollars at a time for Kaitys Disneyland vacation. I thought about skipping doing the floors and some extras in the house. I thought that I could cut back here and there and somehow I could find a way to budget our money and make payments each month to the dentist. And then I realized that I was doing this for a tooth. A tooth that was not even very visual. A tooth that was hurting me like crazy and here I was looking for options on how to save it which would inevitably cause me financial stress. And more importantly- I was trying to save a tooth when I knew that eventually it would end up hurting the quality of Kaitys life- either through less of a vacation that I have promised her and she deserves or in giving her less of a house than she deserves. And the next thing I knew I was just sitting in the chair with tears running down my face. What has caused me to put so much value in my appearance that I was willing to have even thought about this for a moment? From the time I was young I was led to believe that a great deal of my worth was wrapped up in my face and my eyes and my hair and how those things appeared to others. There are a lot of people in this world who have never had people gush over their looks, but when I was younger my looks were remarked about all of the time. And I always felt that those looks were just about all that I had to offer others. Even when I had professional successes, horse successes, dog successes and other successes throughout my life I was still measuring so much of what others thought of me by what I look like. And yet- I have never done that with others. I have never given a whit about what other people look like when it comes to how I feel about them. Especially in the past couple of decades I have been about to see the beauty in everyone. Except for myself. Now understand- this epiphany was BEFORE they started giving me the gas. By the time I had told them to just pull it out I was deep in to my thoughts trying to figure out what had caused me to be such a selfish person that I had -even for a moment- been willing to put my superficial looks ahead of giving Kaity a wonderful vacation. So now the tooth is gone and I have just about been able to stop with the gauze packs to end the bleeding. The dentist was right- it is at the top and in the back and even when I smile I cannot see that there is an empty spot where the tooth used to be. Now I am just trying to figure out what caused me to have an empty spot when it comes to my own self worth. Even as I write these words I feel the tears welling up and threatening to spill out. I am not getting any younger, and I know that I had better figure this all out sooner rather than later. But at least today has given me a good starting point to work it out.
Posted on: Tue, 01 Jul 2014 01:27:06 +0000
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