toothache
I've been sick for weeks. My digestive system has been spasming and clenching and inflamed and I don't know why. I've been working on it. I added some rice, more water and vegetables in the ratio, and reduced the input after rechecking calorie needs. That plus stool softeners and NSAID medication for 3 wks at a time with a week off to reset the body. Finally it was down to a minor concern and I was relaxing from the stress of it. today I was going to have a kind of spa day. Do all the laundry, colour my hair, and take a relaxing bath. I was even feeling able to make phone calls and interact with people! I'd been out interacting yesterday and it went well.
so I have a toothache now. The most frightening thing that ever happens to me is pain in my teeth and more so since I had to quit seeing my last dentist.
Not sure if that's recorded. So I'd been using the hospital dental clinic since my university days. I felt bad using up time and patient space now I wasn't too poor to pay a regular clinic and one of the dentists I'd really liked from there had an office in town.
He'd matured since then and gotten considerably less attentive. Now his assistants, an endless stream of perfect white girls, did almost everything. They were less than gentle about it. Oh they were soft, soft spoken and soft handed, sure. Professional and deft too. But with that special icey edge that only white women seem to know. It was so cold. and when that one girl shoved that hot plaster in my mouth and saw my eyes welling with tears I could tell she felt guilty for being so dismissive when I explained how much I feared it would hurt. Still, they kept treating me that way, acting like my fears and concerns were a nuisance.
Well maybe it is. I don't know. I"m usually too busy with compassion when someone's suffering to be feeling personally afflicted by it. It just seems to me that when you're in a caring profession like dentistry, medicine, ministering or social services, you really ought to expect to encounter fears and pains and it's your job to comfort, not dismiss.
Well anyway, so I'm in severe negative mood again. Can't reach out because I can't be nice to anyone when I'm in pain. I'm trying to keep my negativity to myself but the only way I can lately is to keep to myself. I try to be in the moment, mindful and aware, and then the pain floods in. Whether it's a pain from my inflamed colon, pain from my cramped back, or pain now from my toothache, or the headache from all the tension, how do I stay in the moment and be happy? How do I overcome all that pain and radiate the cheery positivkty required to have human company and care?
What bugs me more is seeing people like Tom who whine and fuss their way through life and people rain support on them. Why are other people allowed to have problems but I'm being unpleasant and need to be sent off?
And how bad is this tooth going to be? Will it go away overnight because it's phantom sensitivity? Or will I wind up with a hole in my face because I can't afford fancy dentistry? I think it's the tooth that got capped, inexpertly, by a dentist who busted the tooth out with a flying dental dam clamp.
I mean seriously, I've always been afraid of dentists even without that sort of crap going on. I see why people get their whole mouth yanked in one great painful session, heal the wounds and live with dentures. One last suffering session and never again do you have to deal with that. But I have my vanity, and my parents had dentures and I know they're a prosthetic not as good as the original. What's more, they don't release you from mouth pain, only mouth doctors. The dentures cause mouth pain equal to or greater than teeth (excepting rotten roots). so it's a release from the fear of rotten teeth and dentists, but not all the little nuisances.
Anway, I'm trying to keep calm, trying to continue my plans for today in spite of the sting,a nd praying it's just a random sensitivity, not rot. There's no taste or smell of rot and I've been taking very good care of my teeth. It's just the toothpaste I've been using, colgate pro sensitivity, has actually been doing it's job and that sting hasn't been around for years now.
It does feel more like sensitivity than rot. Maybe if I start brushing my teeth immediately after chewing food. I used to chew on something every hour or so and there wasn't much point trying to keep my teeth clean, but with the paleo diet I actually bridge between meals in a traditional manner, so I can just brush after meals.
so I have a toothache now. The most frightening thing that ever happens to me is pain in my teeth and more so since I had to quit seeing my last dentist.
Not sure if that's recorded. So I'd been using the hospital dental clinic since my university days. I felt bad using up time and patient space now I wasn't too poor to pay a regular clinic and one of the dentists I'd really liked from there had an office in town.
He'd matured since then and gotten considerably less attentive. Now his assistants, an endless stream of perfect white girls, did almost everything. They were less than gentle about it. Oh they were soft, soft spoken and soft handed, sure. Professional and deft too. But with that special icey edge that only white women seem to know. It was so cold. and when that one girl shoved that hot plaster in my mouth and saw my eyes welling with tears I could tell she felt guilty for being so dismissive when I explained how much I feared it would hurt. Still, they kept treating me that way, acting like my fears and concerns were a nuisance.
Well maybe it is. I don't know. I"m usually too busy with compassion when someone's suffering to be feeling personally afflicted by it. It just seems to me that when you're in a caring profession like dentistry, medicine, ministering or social services, you really ought to expect to encounter fears and pains and it's your job to comfort, not dismiss.
Well anyway, so I'm in severe negative mood again. Can't reach out because I can't be nice to anyone when I'm in pain. I'm trying to keep my negativity to myself but the only way I can lately is to keep to myself. I try to be in the moment, mindful and aware, and then the pain floods in. Whether it's a pain from my inflamed colon, pain from my cramped back, or pain now from my toothache, or the headache from all the tension, how do I stay in the moment and be happy? How do I overcome all that pain and radiate the cheery positivkty required to have human company and care?
What bugs me more is seeing people like Tom who whine and fuss their way through life and people rain support on them. Why are other people allowed to have problems but I'm being unpleasant and need to be sent off?
And how bad is this tooth going to be? Will it go away overnight because it's phantom sensitivity? Or will I wind up with a hole in my face because I can't afford fancy dentistry? I think it's the tooth that got capped, inexpertly, by a dentist who busted the tooth out with a flying dental dam clamp.
I mean seriously, I've always been afraid of dentists even without that sort of crap going on. I see why people get their whole mouth yanked in one great painful session, heal the wounds and live with dentures. One last suffering session and never again do you have to deal with that. But I have my vanity, and my parents had dentures and I know they're a prosthetic not as good as the original. What's more, they don't release you from mouth pain, only mouth doctors. The dentures cause mouth pain equal to or greater than teeth (excepting rotten roots). so it's a release from the fear of rotten teeth and dentists, but not all the little nuisances.
Anway, I'm trying to keep calm, trying to continue my plans for today in spite of the sting,a nd praying it's just a random sensitivity, not rot. There's no taste or smell of rot and I've been taking very good care of my teeth. It's just the toothpaste I've been using, colgate pro sensitivity, has actually been doing it's job and that sting hasn't been around for years now.
It does feel more like sensitivity than rot. Maybe if I start brushing my teeth immediately after chewing food. I used to chew on something every hour or so and there wasn't much point trying to keep my teeth clean, but with the paleo diet I actually bridge between meals in a traditional manner, so I can just brush after meals.