Well, that's done

As I said on Twitter: my dental check-up is over so Monday can only get better, right.

(Do not taunt Happy Fun Monday....)

This was just the every-six-months thing that those of us with dental insurance (or who can easily afford about $120 out of pocket) do. (My insurance covers all of "prophylactic" care, so it's free to me - well, FSVO free; I do pay about $30 as a monthly premium, which essentially works out to two visits plus a set of x-rays every year, but since it's a small amount taken out of my paycheck, I don't notice).

This was the "big" visit - x-rays, and cleaning/scraping, and I was also due for a gum check.

The good news, up front: my teeth are all sound so I don't have to go back (barring some emergency) until December. And the dentist, he had a busy schedule today, so he was doing the checks when he could get in, which meant he interrupted the hygienist halfway through the sonicating (scaling with an electronic thing) so I got a break and also I found out relatively early in the appointment I wasn't going to have to have serious work done, so that made it more tolerable.

I don't like the sonicator, though. It makes a high pitched whine that hurts my ears a little and for part of it (especially on the upper teeth, which is worse for me) she switched to the old-fashioned hand tool, which takes longer but seems less painful.

The x-rays are not bad, they use a digital system that's fast and they don't have the old flappy "bitewing" things (where the edge of the wing would always tickle the roof of my mouth and make me want to cough any more).

The hygienist did say it looked like I had "some bone loss" but that it was not unusual with age. Ugh, so I have another thing to worry about, I guess. (Maybe I need to go and get a baseline bone scan, given my family history of osteoporosis. I will have to ask my doctor about it when I see her later this summer)

The gum check is weird and uncomfortable - they jab a little pick into your gums, repeatedly (at least once for each tooth). The hygienist wears a headset she talks into and reads off a string of numbers that the machine repeats back to her, and she also notes when there's bleeding (I seem to have a lot of bleeding but she also said that didn't seem to indicate disease in me). The numbers I got were all very low and she explained that any number that is 3 or under is good and indicates healthy gums, so yay me, I guess? She did suggest a water-pik might help flush things out better and cut down on the bleeding; she thought it was maybe bacteria in there (not pathogenic ones, apparently)

But the whole "repeated jabbing" thing. It could be a form of torture. I make it through the gum check because I know it's necessary to monitor health and I know it will be over eventually but it is NOT pleasant.

Then it was sonicating and scraping. I tend to be a "hyperaccumulator" (lots of calcium goo on my teeth) even though I brush twice a day and floss daily, so there's a lot of that for me.

Finally, cleaning, which tells me I'm almost free.

(They also ultrasonically cleaned my mouthguard for me - it's got a few chips and pockets in it now that the brush won't clean out so it gets a little nasty over time)

But yeah. I am glad to be done with that for now.