I’m not the only one who associates tooth decay with moral failure, am I?
I have no problem telling a doctor that I last bothered to use my nasal spray approximately six months before allergy season started, or that I’ve been getting less than the required minimum amount of sleep for, oh, five years now. Leaving strep throat untreated for three weeks? Whyever not?
But every time I lie back in that padded chair, I agonize over the possibility that my dentist will look in there and see signs that I haven’t been flossing, or fluoridating, or brushing like I should. Please don’t let that stain be a cavity! I’ll be good!
Anyway, no new holes. I also found out that tea stains teeth worse than coffee, which means that I should drink even more coffee. And foods like beets and leafy greens also stain teeth, which means that coffee is an essential part of a healthy diet.
{ 33 comments }
I was reading somewhere — possibly that story from the NYT a few months ago, with pictures, about meth mouth — that teeth are becoming one of the more reliable indicators of class. After all, rich people and people with dental insurance through their jobs can get cavities fixed, have crooked teeth straightened, get dentures, etc.
Piny:
Totally reality based, I think of it as Vitamin X.
Coffee is an essential food group or at least an essential something.
Can you get good coffee in Utah?
Dentist? What’s a dentist?
Coke is my drug of choice (that’s soda/pop for all y’all non-Texans). I’m also glad to hear that my many years of avoiding leafy greens is good for something.
No, in a C-store it’s twelve days old.
You have to make it yourself or go to one of the ultra few coffee houses that is not a Starbucks.
Besides being anti-cigarette and anti-booze, Mormons are anti-caffine as well (The word of wisdom preaches against hot beverages lest you burn your mouth). Caffine can be taken in Diet Coke to which the Mormons are all seriously addicted. The hot drink proscription does not include Postum (GAK) or good old American Hot Chocolate (don’t ask why).
I applaud you, Piny, for going to the dentist. I haven’t been for almost 7 years now because of a pathological fear of The Chair. I know there are holes in there too…I am just terrified of someone professional seeing them. Does anyone else share this pathological fear?
Magis,
So is Mexican hot chocolate a no-no in Utah?
Of course, I eat copious amounts of pretty much everything that stains teeth: chocolate, tea, beets, dark greens, tomatoes, red wine. My teeth are going to look British soon.
Probably. Fer sure if it has tequila in it or French vanilla added.
Yes! Not to mention an indicator of another indicator of class: both diet and “diet.” There was an article in alternet; I have a follow-up post coming.
I used to date a guy who had a tooth missing because he’d had a cavity at a time when he was too poor to pay for a dentist. He was very self-conscious about that, to the point where he accused me of mocking him for it during a fight (I hadn’t said a word; my mother had the same issue). I realize now he probably had a lot of class and moral issues wrapped up in running around with a missing tooth and dating a woman who made more money than he did.
Slim Slow Slider:
Yes. As i recall it, i haven’t gone since i got my braces off almost six years ago. Though for me it’s more because of a fear of all that metallic shit rattling around in my mouth. And a ridiculously low tolerance for sharp pain.
Laughing gas, people.
Even for cleanings. Request it ahead of time, bring an iPod, and it’ll be over before you know it.
If you haven’t been to the dentist in years and you finally go – pick a dentist that will numb your mouth. I skipped 2 years of visits and they perform a “gross debridement” or something where they use that plaque scraper thing under your gum line. It takes forever. Now I just go every 6 months and I floss so I don’t get the flossing lecture for the millionth time. Flossing does make a big difference, especially if you have allergies – your mouth will feel cleaner.
zuzu:
Yeah, that’s what my dad does, and he’s encouraged me to do the same. I know I should, but…yeah…
Oh, trust me on this one.
I became very fearful of the drill after a bad dental-student experience involving not enough novocaine and a cavity in a wisdom tooth, meaning that it was right in my ear. And I could feel it.
So every time afterwards that I’ve had to get drilled, I required several shots of novocaine and was so tense I could still feel the drill. Until I started getting gas. Then I didn’t care, and I eventually made peace with the drill again.
So, gas. Do it.
piny, oh, yeah. And an even worse moral failure is if your child gets a cavity. Cavities in middle class children are now regarded as neglect. (And don’t get me started on the dog.)
Dental student experience? At the cheap clinic at NYU? I did that when I was a baby lawyer, broke and underwater with loans. Then I got married, got on my wife’s dental, and found a real dentist. I learned that a root canal by a real pro should be a walk in the park.
I have the kind of teeth that are going to drive me into bankruptcy — they were okay until I spent several years with no insurance and super poor, meaning that a few minor cavities became major abscesses. So I’m less afraid of the judgements of my dentist than I am of the bill at the end.
Good to know about beets and tooth stains, though. I always look for new reasons to avoid the little bastards. And I’m not sure I’m physicially capable of upping my coffee intake much — I think any more would probably send me into convulsions. Ex-barista, still very much an addict — coffee was our one “benefit” at that job, so I took full advantage.
I could not be bothered to floss until I started using those little plastic floss pick thingies. They don’t require you to figure out how to fit all those fingers in your mouth, and are in general a much much easier way to get the job done. Right tool for the right job and all that. I was kind of freaked out at the idea of throwing away all of those little pieces of plastic every day, but you can also get ones that you use over and over and just replace the floss. You’ll never get the flossing lecture again – because you actually do it
Thomas, the clinic was at UM. You never appreciate the light touch of a professional dentist until you have a student snapping unwaxed floss into your gums because your teeth are crowded and unwaxed floss is all they have.
Okay, its been a long time since I lived in Salt Lake City but it gets a bad rap. Sure, the drinks might be weak and they call a cover charge a “membership,” but its a surprisingly hospitable city. When I lived there it was punk central for bands from California to places east. You could always get good coffee at the bakery/coffee joint on 4rth street downtown, and there’s some really good eating up near the university, downtown and in Park City. Sure, the Church owns half the city buildings but there’s always been a thriving rebellion under the surface there. In fact, I never knew as many people who grew and smoked pot more freely outside of California….people use to offer it to you from their front porch as you walked by in the Avenues.
Someone’s got to stick up for SLC.
Oh lord. I once had a student dentist sewed to my gums. Plus I had to pay ahead in cash for the indignity.
After that I found a real dentist who, to my good fortune, is not only good at dentisting (sculpture? microwelding?) but a genius at pain control. I actually had a fine old time getting a root canal. No, really. Combination of Xylocaine, nitrous oxide, and prior sedation for the big stuff.
I got old enough to mostly stop getting cavities — yeah, that happens — but all those misalignments I couldn’t afford to take care of when I was a kid got worse, and I need some recon stuff where I had extractions (see student dentist, sewed) and the whole mess has to be straightened first. So I’m in braces at the past-ripe age of 56, not for looks but so I can chew, eventually. Hey, straight teeth by 60!
The orthodontist has a payment plan. Whew.
Glad to hear I’m not the only one who fears/loathes the “you need to floss” lecture. *sigh* My issue with it is that I KNOW I should do this — it’s just that every time I get halfway set to a new, good habit of doing so, something crops up that throws me off of it, and my new, good habit crashes and burns. I’m to the point of requesting (relatively politely, through clenched teeth if necessary) that we skip the damned lecture already; I’m thirty-mumble, I’m not STUPID, nor am I lazy. I just never got into the habit as a kid (was not emphasized by my family), and am having a hard time establishing it now. Thank you for caring, now GET OFF MY BACK!! And, can we please note that in my record, so I don’t have to have this conversation again? Thanks.
To make it worse, one of my fillings has broken and needs to be replaced, and I don’t want to face the flossing lecture coupled with the “why haven’t we seen you for a cleaning recently, like in the last year” lecture. (Um, because y’all lecture me like I’m SIX when I do come in? Maybe…!) To make it worse, the broken filling is in my front teeth; difficult to numb appropriately, and easy to fiddle with your tongue, which means I have a sore on my tongue now.
Ok, /whine. All us whiners just need to suck it up and take care of our teeth. But boy — is it nice to know I’m not the only one!
I was born without enamel and I have acidic saliva because I smoke, so my teeeth literally just fall out…randomly… and it is disgusting, but there is nothing I can do about it. I’ve spent over $20,000 on crowns and veneers and root canals (this is WITH insurance) simply because people are judgemental assholes who decide if you have bad teeth that you have bad hygeine or have no character. Not bitter or anything. Assholes.
You know, I had been thinking of blogging about how people use flossing as shorthand for moral goodness. As in, “Please God, I’ll floss!” or “I don’t understand why this is happening to me. I treat my children well. I floss every day.”
The best dental experience I had was when I lived in Hawaii. My dentist was on the 20th floor of an office building overlooking Ala Moana beach in Waikiki. Nothing like a panoramic view of the South Pacific to get your mind off a root canal…
At least the dentist didn’t take one look and say “The horror! The horror!”
Or, “Is it safe?”
Unless you have generous parents, going to college is hell on your teeth. I’ve been looking into several graduate programs around the country, and a few have medical/dental insurance.
Gosh, someone finally figured out that people shouldn’t suffer needlessly just because they’ve taken time from working to pursue an education. Enlightment.
i finally got “scared straight” when my dentist did this thing where she measures your gum pockets, and mine were all, erm, not right. and when i said ‘is there anything i can do to fix that” she kinda shrugged said “use a soft toothbrush so you don’t jack up the newly exposed bits and floss’ and then moved on.
i also got hte reach flosser which is SO AWESOME. makes flossing fast and too easy for me to say ‘i’ll just do that later’ (i also tried a wierd electric flosser and i highly recommend against it. evil dagger thingy)
Y’all, just start living with someone who’s obsessive about dental hygiene, and pretty soon the guilt will get you flossing too, and then poof! No more lectures from the dentist, much less scraping with the gnarly poky instruments…bliss.
The point about equating clean-looking, even teeth with moral quality is interesting, since people with money can pay to have all their ’sins’ fixed (hey, I did when I got dental insurance) while people without money/dental insurance, even with the best self-care, can’t necessarily have the same ‘look’ or meet the same ’standard.’
Read this article and tell me what you think. I found it some time ago, as you can see, but it’s very good. It’s often been known that poverty = poor oral health care. I have a faculty member who goes out to at-risk urban schools to do dental clinics and such. It’s really hard to watch so many little kids with rotting teeth.
Thank you! I’ve been trying to find it ever since zuzu made a reference to it! (“teeth” and “class” didn’t give google much to go on.) I’ll post about it. I’ve got some other thoughts about what I would and would not feel ashamed of; I’ll put those up, too.
Comments on this entry are closed.