Dentists, possibly second only to clowns, are the all-time most dreaded figures lurking in the shadows of one’s childhood. Worse than the bogeyman, certainly more sinister than any monsters sequestered under the bed - the friendly, neighborhood dentist is armed with an arsenal of sharp metallic drills, hooks, and other mysterious devices that may or may not be legal to use under the Geneva Convention. The little pat on the head and the free tubes of minty toothpaste doled out at the end do little to make up for the preceding torture.

This fear of dentists stuck with me past childhood, after my mom stopped forcing me to go on dental visits on a regular basis. The visits became less and less frequent, and after I went off to live on my own, stopped entirely. I am more than a little embarrassed to admit, to the Internet (and to those of you who I actually have to interact with in person), this little confession: prior to my last dental checkup, I hadn’t been in just over five years.

I decided I’d eventually have to go, one way or the other - I’d been informed of my sporadic nightly bruxism, and knowing that this couldn’t bode well for my dental health, figured that this was something I would need to address before long. Combined with the awesome dental insurance I get as one of the perks of this job, and krissy’s recommendation of a good dentist in town, I finally picked up the phone one day and set myself an appointment.

Besides the whole thing about not going to the dentist, I have taken more or less good care of my teeth: I brush every day, in the morning and at night, for at least two and a half minutes (one hundred and fifty Mississippis); I floss intermittently, which is more than I can say for some of the roommates I’ve had over the years. I’m not much of a sweet tooth, I don’t eat copious amounts of candy, and I don’t drink pop very often. Still, when you haven’t been in for a cleaning for quite some time, the first revisit is bound to be painful, and tends to involve a particular device I call the Sonic Scythe of Satan:

A sonic scaler. Just looking at this thing invokes the sound of a thousand hyper-pitched bees thrumming through my nerves

Believe it or not, my hygienist claimed that some people actually like having this dystopic contraption poking around in their heads, as an alternative to the simpler, though slower, hand scaler. These people must have been born without ears or auditory complexes. The noise still haunts the edge of my nightmares, disturbing my fitful rest and dreams of razor-toothed hooks and rotating blades.

After that lovely incident, I was told I had to come back :cry:. I had, after all these years of not going to the dentist, acquired one cavity (again, embarrassingly enough, in one of my front teeth). Luckily, it was a tiny one. So I went back this morning, had my gums pricked and injected with blissfully numbing agent (which made me think that dentist visits may not be entirely without perks), and sat back as my mouth turned into an industrial work zone. Saws, drills, jackhammers, everything but whistling men, rooted about in my head, carving my teeth into submission.

Two things I have taken from this collective dental experience: first, that putting off going to the dentist only causes things to be far, far worse. I’ll brush my teeth eight times a day and visit the dentist every week, if it means I never have to hear that demon sound again.

Secondly, thank the gods above and below for the existence of topical analgesic. Mmm, sweet nerve-deadening bliss.