Big, Scary, Bad, Dentists

The thing with the dentist is I have a very real phobia. I know no one likes the dentist and most people are a little bit afraid but I am actually really afraid. So much so that I act like a crazy person.

I am always on a search for the perfect dentist. I have been through several and they just didn’t suit me. Before I found my the dentist I have used for the past four years I had a dentist who insisted I would be fine in the chair if he played me music videos while he worked. Nope I bit him as soon as he put his finger in my mouth (I was only 22 give me a break). I was with another for a short while I even thought we might get on until he made the mistake of putting his little pointy thing in my mouth and I threw up all over him, in my defence I did warn him, I just don’t think he believed me.

My last dentist was better however. I told him what to expect: I will turn up crying and shaking and usually holding onto my dad. Once in the chair I have to be told exactly what will happen and given lots of warning before attempting to put things in my mouth. Under no circumstances is the dentist to put anything sharp or pointy into my mouth while awake and it there is work that needs doing I must, MUST be put asleep first.

These are my rules and my last dentist pretty much followed them, there was very little screaming vomiting and biting. But I have moved house I can not carry on with my old dentist I must register with a new one and now I’m afraid he (or she) will not understand. I am dreading it, I know how these first meetings go, I tell them and they think I’m exaggerating… yeah we’ll see.

Lots of people try to talk me out of it. I often hear ‘They aren’t going to hurt you.’ Or ‘it’s only a check up’ or even ‘they are there to help you.’ Do people think I don’t know that? I am smart I am logical I know that nothing bad is actually going to happen to me in the dentist chair, at the most a slight discomfort. I know all this right now, sat at my desk far from the white room, with the sickening smell and that drill noise (oh god the noise). But once I get to the dentist I can’t do it, all reason leaves me and logic doesn’t even enter my head. You can’t reason with fear, sorry that’s a fact.

I do go to the dentist every six months. I go and I suffer it. I book the day off work (it takes the whole day) I prepare myself I  cry and I scream and I hope that everything is going to be fine. I put myself through this because I know I have to and if I don’t, when I do go it will be worse.

I used to think I was a big, scaredy-cat, baby for being this way but recently I have changed my mind, in fact I think I’m brave. Very brave actually, if you had something you were meant to do, which scared you so much you vomited and lost all reason, would you face it? I am willing to bet most people wouldn’t go, most would just ignore it, and because I don’t I think that makes me braver than most.

And if you need anymore proof dentists are actually evil beings…