Reporting Straight from the Dentist’s Chair
I had three back-to-back visits to my dentist’s office this week and so I knew that this week I am going to be reporting straight from my dentist’s chair. A chair that most of us try to stay away from for as long as we can, no matter how good a friend of ours, the dentist is.
Thanks for asking, I am doing absolutely fine. It was just some routine dental care visits. I was postponing it for a very long time and then, decided to get it all done in one shot. I have seen this happen very often to a lot of people I know. Procrastination makes things seem so much scarier than they actually are. We keep procrastinating things. Then, when we finally start doing it, we realize it is not as bad or scary as we thought it would be. As a result, we breeze through it.
I must say that I like my dentist’s office. From the chair, I see a spectacular view of the hills, blooming trees, and the vast blue sky. Though I like my dentist talking to me about healthy habits of oral hygiene, I must say that I don’t particularly like to see pictures of different teeth patterns printed all over the wall. I don’t want my already nervous self to look at a set of dentures smiling at me from every nook and corner. I am glad my dentist’s office doesn’t have these pictures.
One of the biggest lessons I learned on the dentist’s chair is that the anticipation of pain ( or sensitivity in this case) is bigger than the pain ( or sensitivity) itself. Each time I cringed on that chair, it was in the anticipation of pain. Thanks to the advancements in dentistry, the numbing gel, the numbing shots etc the procedure itself is not painful. But right from the time we sit on that chair, we are so stressed in the anticipation of pain. Pretty much similar to how we spend a major chunk of our life in anticipation of things going bad, business/ market going down, health deteriorating, relationships becoming sour, etc. As much as we do not want any of these things to happen, we still anticipate them. We mostly do it on the pretext of preparing for them.
Amidst the grinding and drilling noises, I must admit that thoughts about this blog was one of my positive distractions. While on the chair, another positive distraction was the book that I am currently reading. I was imagining myself helping Isabelle cross the Pyrenees Mountains with the Airmen she picked up in Paris. The book that I am currently reading is The Nightingale by Kristen Hannah and I am so loving the book. I was glad that even under uncomfortable situations, positive distractions came so handy.
So, the three aspects that became really clear to me while sitting on the Dentist’s chair are:
1. Procrastination makes things seem scarier than they actually are.
2. Anticipation of pain is bigger than the pain itself.
3. Positive distractions work so well even while on a dentist’s chair.
Keep Smiling! Every smile is beautiful!
Image by StockSnap from Pixabay
Comments
Your story resonated with me. I too was on a dentist’s chair last month . The wait for the dentist, while sitting on the dreaded chair, was more hurting than the actual pain. So the next time I carried a book to read during the wait period and it partially eased my discomfort of painful anticipation.
That is a good way to distract oneself Saji. A scary place , that dentist’s chair.
Many people dread going to the dentist. My dad was a dentist, so I didn’t mind having my teeth checked and cleaned. I hope you are happy with your mouth now, or at least happier than you were last week.
That’s good to know Anne. Yes, I am in a much better place now. Thank you.
I’m glad you got your dental issues taken care of! And I agree, the anticipation of the pain is usually much worse than any pain or discomfort which actually arrives. These days, it’s rare to feel pain at the dentist, even during the most elaborate procedures.
Yes Ann. Anticipation of pain makes that place a scary one.