The Dentist

Well I guess this week is the week to take shots at the medical profession. Just kidding Dr D. Actually considering how much medical assessments and procedures persons close to me are having this week I should be bigging up all medical workers everywhere and in truth yea I got a lot a respect for all them.

Still somebody ask me to post this thing here that I wrote about the dentist a few years back after one of my root canals. I was trying to make it a bit more understandable for my readers but most of it in bajan so y'all may get a crash course today. Anyway remember disclaimer: is just joke I'm making although I'm sure some of you have similar experiences. Oh and also I know some of my readers know my dentist so I not making fun of the bredren. If I go back to the man an him hurt up my mout unnecessarily I blaming you. Anyway enough disclaimer, read on.

The Dentist

I aint one of those fellas that duz frighten easy. People that know me can tell ya that. Actually to tell the truth I aint really scared of a fella even if he bigger than me, got two big rocks to pelt at me or even a gun to shoot muh dead. That doan worry me at all but ya know who I really frighten for …..the dentist.

Nuh lie people, I real, real frighten of the dentist. Dem fellas duz give me cold sweats and shivers up my spine an all sort a heart palpitations so I duz try my best to avoid them as much as humanly possible.

I know some a wunnah saying man you is bare boo! How you could be frightened for the dentist? Chupse! Man that aint nothing to be frighten for. Next you gine be telling we that you frighten for spiders and fellas in clown suits and them sorts of things so.

Well all wunnah can laugh at me but I will tell wunnah man this aint no sort of idle fright cause in most of my dealings wid de dentist I get unfair bad, bad, bad. The dentist duz leff me skin out, and catspraddle wid muh mouth open, dribbling an I duz cann do nuttin at all but sit there and tek it. So that is why I frighten of them fellas an duz try to avoid them like de plague.

I mean at one time I thought it was just specific dentists that was scary so I left off seeing one dat hurt up my gums an went ta another one and what he do but hurt up my jaw instead. Them first two did men so I decide alright let me get a woman dentist, she is of the fairer and gentler sex so she cant possibly be like dem big hardback men that hurt up my mouth. Wrong! Fairer and gentler sex what! Chupse! If anything de woman hurt up my mouth worst than them guys! Sitting in that chair, I was beginning to think that she was somebody I did know from someplace else and I had do her something wrong and she was trying to get she revenge on muh now.

The thing was that the female dentist shared an office with some other female dentists and all the assistants were beautiful young black women too so whenever I went there man I was in awe. Even before the novocaine incapacitate my mouth, my lips drop down to the floor. But I learn the hard way that it’s really hard to chat up women after ya had a dental procedure and ya mouth hurting. See me there trying to pose off hard by the secretary but then my mouth would start dribbling and my lips cant come together to make proper words so all chances of trying to get in even a little flirtatious word gone.

Anyway so I couldn’t chat up the ladies and the female dentist beating up my mouth as bad if not worse than the two fellows I saw before her so I say well alright enough a this hurt mouth ting, I know a fella that went school with me that is a dentist now so let me give him a try. We were friends at school never had nuh sorta trouble wid one another therefore so he shouldn’t have any sort of beef with me an try to willingly hurt me. But ya know what? I musse did do he something wrong that I doan remember and that he hold up in he thoughts to get back at me cause the man put sum lashes in my mouth two years ago an I didn’t want to go back to a dentist since.

Anyways I aint had much choice the past few weeks cause I feel a lil pain in one tooth. So I grudgingly mek the appointment and gone down scared as ever to get this thing sort out.

Now I swear dat whenever I go to any dentist they duz feel like dem juss win lotto or something so an be trying ta mek as much money off me as possible. Dem musse duz say well he don’t come to see us too often so when he come let we get as much money as possible one time cause we aint know when next we gine see he.

One time I went to a dentist and tell him that one a my up top back teeth hurting muh. De man look at me and say “man nuttin aint wrong wid dat tooth um is juss natural hurt ya experiencing doan worry bout it. But ya know ya got cavities here, here, here and here and ‘potential’ cavities here, here and here an oh yea ya know you could do wid braces too and what about them wisdom teeth them hurting ya? I swear when the man see my mouth he musse juss see a tooth buffet that he could pick cavities galore, root canals, wisdom teeth extraction all sort of things out of. .

Well, same thing happen today. Went in to the Dentist. “Doctor I loss a filling.” “Oh don’t worry bout dat too much but ya know this other filling brek off, that one loose and wait dem is wisdom teeth ya got back deyso? Man dem bothering you?”

And ya know I think all of these dental fellows family to George Bush cause they always talking about pre-emptive strikes and preventative measures and pre-emptive fillings an always trying to solve problems that don’t yet exist. Sizing up my mouth for invasion. Showing me diagrams and pointing at x rays talking talk like the military men at the press briefings on CNN bout ‘if we make an incursion at the root sending in the fourth artillery division with the silver amalgam filling as backup we can limit the spread of the cavity by bombarding it with a precise smart bomb filling strike forcing the cavity to retreat before it becomes a danger to the tooth around it. After that we send in the 3rd airborne and ……. ” or something so. Had me thinking my mouth is downtown Baghdad or Falluja as the novocaine started to seep into my head.

And ya ever notice how them duz tek de x-rays in the dentist office? The Dentist or he assistant duz put a big lead thing on your body supposedly to protect ya but really to stop ya from being able to get up and run away and then point the x-ray thing, that look like one of them laser guns on the Millennium Falcon, at your jaw like them trying to rob ya.

An as if the gun x-ray thing pointing at ya jaw dont frighten ya enuff, well what duz really get ya worries is that after the dentist or the assistant put the lead thing on you and getting ready to take the x-ray they duz literally run out the room like they frighten for the x-ray gun.

How safe are you, the patient, supposed to feel when you seeing the experts running like that? Man that duz really got me worried cause some of those dental assistants duz really take off outta that room like Ben Johnson in the starting blocks once they set up the x-ray thing. I duz be sitting there thinking “wait this thing like it dangerous. Look wait for me, wunnah aint leffin me in hayso wid this dangerous weapon. Ya lie! I aint ready ta die yet Looka let me dash way this heavy lead thing cause I right behind you”. I mean think about it, ya cant expect to point nothing so that look like a gun at a man jaw an den run out the room an leave him there so by himself. Wha the ting look like a gun with a big nozzle you could imagine wha size bullets dat must fire? Cuhdear man one shot wud tek off my head! That is unfair! I aint do wunnah nothing fa wunnah ta be treating me so.

Anyways once that x-ray thing done now and they put you to lie down now de first thing they doing is opening your mouth wide, wide, wide. Now ya duz gotta virtually hold dat pose de whole time ya in de chair too and depending on the procedure that could be anywhere from 15 minutes ta over an hour. Man last time I was there I had to hold my mouth open so long dat when I did finish I couldn’t get um push back down to normal. Had me walking bout fa a good few days wid my mouth and jaw skin up and people asking me if I had a stroke recently. nuh lie!

An den come the needle. Cuhdear I duz juss close my eyes cause sometimes the needle duz hurt an sometimes um don’t but just the anticipation of getting juk duz juss got me feel a certain way.

Now once dat novocaine start ta get in the system ya duz loss all sorta feeling in ya mouth. Which I guess is good for the dental procedures but when you gotta keep ya mouth skin open wide an that requires certain muscles an them aint working cause the jaw an gums gone sleep ya duz be in bare trouble. Dat duz be when them start mekkin ya mouth into a construction zone.

Dem duz bring out all of WMDs (weapons of mouth destruction) and start pelting in ya mouth one after another. Oh ya jaw wun stand open? ok we gine prop it open wid this thing here. And while we at it look lets put sum screws, a few long scraper looking things, a sander, a drill and a big hose in deyso too. Sometimes I think if I duz look up an see if a fella putting a mini shovel in there too cause with all them tools I can only conclude that them mixing concrete up inside my mouth or some sorta thing so.

And I aint know bout anybody else mouth but my mouth can only fit a certain amount a things in it at once so I duz gotta open wider and wider till ya jaw all but unhinge an de fella drilling an de assistant hosing out and suctioning out an they scraping an jucking and I there praying to God that my mouth will close when ya ready.

Actually it dawned on me that maybe the dentist and the assistant might not need all of those tools but in fact they got on some sort of side bet on how big my mouth actually is. I feel if I was to come early for the appointment I might hear something like “Boy he mouth real big den! I bet we could get 5 a de scrapers and 3 a dem screw things, a hose, the drill and even two pair a high heel shoes in deyso.”

Now during the procedure occasionally the dentist and assistant will tell you to rinse with some water but by that time the jaw and gums numb an ya lips feel like somebody skin dem back permanently. Ya duz cant even wrap ya mouth round de lil cup a water so before ya reach the sink properly ya all but dribbling all ova yaself.

Then ya back wid de twenty or so drills, screws, sanders inside your mouth and you juss hoping that de concrete dem mixing in deyso is the quick setting kind so ya can be over an dun wid de foolishness cause the man juking up ya mouth like sum kinda medieval torturer an ya know dat once the novocaine wear off ya gine be in some serious pain.

And then the dentist duz play he asking ya questions an all sorta small talk. Ya can barely think straight wid all the construction noise plus ya cant make no intelligent sound from your mouth just grunts but them trying ta make idle chatter with you. And with me, I deyso thinking “man I hope he know what he doing. Wait he shouldn’t be concentrating more on wha in my mouth instead of all this chit chat or um is juss he secretly laughing at me and showing off like “ha ha I can talk an you mouth full up a steel an you cant say a thing, ha ha ha”. And you cant even nod to nod when he say something come to think of it cause if ya move an he drilling bram! another tooth gone thru de eddoes so ya cann risk dat.

Well today the dentist pull out another tool on me that I never see yet. I aint know if George W and the CIA aware a this tool and if the weapons inspectors see um yet but um look like one of them ray guns you see pun old sci-fi movies with a big funnel looking piece near the end. Man when that get push in my mouth along with de sander, shovel, scraper, drill and thing that prop open my jaws I just didn’t know what to do. An I still aint know what the ray gun looking ting was for yet ya know cause dem point um in muh mouth a few times but I doan know wha de significance was.

Anyways so finally they finish an start disarming the WMDs and removing dem. The screws get tek out, the shovel , scraper, drill, ray gun all done with, and the thing propping up my mouth gone at last so now my mouth just flop shut like when the wind blow in a door. bram!

All like feeling desert my mouth long, long time an I cant even feel my top lip. Them give me sum more water, I dribble way all a it in to the sink and I try to say a few words like ‘man what I do to you that you treat my mouth so today?’ but my mouth wouldn’t cooperate with me and all one sided an I cant talk properly so all that come out was ‘mmmm mmmm mmmm mmmunmmm mm mmmmm mmmmmm.’ And I couldn’t even coordinate my lips and mouth properly to chupse. And the dentist just smiling at me.

So I juss left the office, all half foolish like, with the Novocaine still in my head, my cheeks and jaws hurting, and my facial muscles sore and not responding properly. I’m just hoping I can make it home before I run into someone I know cause I know de first thing I gine hear is “Well looka you doah! Boy wha happen to you, you had a stroke?” Cuhdear!