Are You Afraid of The Dentist?

Though, i dont think im afraid of the dentist, i always had my mum accompany me to dental appointments. That is, save for the two times conducted at school.

Yesterday, i was a brave girl going on my own meeting the neighbourhood dentist i've never seen before!

See... my mum and the usual dentist Dr Seah are good friends and we always got discount cos my mum referred him to all her friends too and remind n encourage us to visit him often. But unfortunately, he's fully booked in Dec and i absolutely need to get it done by this week so as to be able to claim it for 2007. So only the female dentist is available.

To my surprise, i really liked her!

She welcomed me warmly as i walked into her "office". And said she will review the condition of my teeth first before deciding what to do bcos i told her i have $100 to spend.

She said that my teeth are very good esp the front ones and that there are no holes to be filled! Only the back of my lower front teeth have tartar in between.

It's been 2 years since my last appointment. Last yr was the first yr tt i can claim for dental w the change of employer. But even then, i cldnt go to see the dentist bcos i always find that at the end of the month, i dont have extra to spend on things like these. Prolly bcos i was concentrating more on saving.

I liked the way she explains to me what she is doing and that she is now moving on to the other section of the teeth and so on. She put me at ease and i wasn't scared at all despite being all alone. I still closed my eyes though avoiding to see any sharp equipments and imagining in poking at my teeth n gums! It still hurts a bit but manageable and i just gripped my hands to bear it.

Oh! She also reminded me to brush until the last teeth bcos its getting a bit brown but fortunately no holes yet! She also told me my gum is not so healthy bcos it bleeds so easily. So i hafta brush my gums also.

I asked her a lot of questions why this n that and how to maintain bla bla bla... I also took the opportunity to tell her that my husband thinks my teeth are yellow. She said, "No, it's perfectly normal." Seeing that i'm not convinced, she added, "It's the natural colour of your teeth. Just like some pple from brown eyes while others have blue. You have yellow teeth while others have white teeth. You CAN bleach them White, if you want, at SGD 1,500. It's like dyeing your hair..." Hmmm if its like dyeing hair, certainly it means the colour is temporary? I wondered aloud. and she said, "Yeah.. just like hair it will grow out after 3 - 6 months... the colour will return in 3 yrs time."

After i reported this to Zubair, he said, "Yeah i told you all my family said your teeth are very nice. and i have long since agreed with them too." Yeah yeah... :P

Total spent? SGD 95! Normal scaling and polishing is actually $60, but bcos there was some difficult scaling to remove stubborn tartar on my 4 backmost molars so that's $35 extra. Luckily i can claim up to $100 and its end of the year already so i dont begrudge them.

So they recommend me to come every 6 months to prevent build up of problems. And i resolve to keep to the appointment. With VISA, paying first claim later is of no problem already. Alhamdulillah.

Anyways, don't be afraid of the dentist! The more frequent you go, the less painful the treatment is.