Root Canal

On Monday, I went to the dentist for the first time in like 4 years. It was a local office and they were nice enough, though they didn't really tell me anything that was going on. As they were finishing, the hygienist mentioned that there was a cavity. Okay, no big deal, the dentist doesn't bother me, but as I am checking out, the receptionist was mentioning that I need to be scheduled for a root canal. Big jump from cavity. This wasn't a horrible surprise, seeing as a filling had fallen out while I was pregnant with Mark, and the molar eventually broke after he was born. I wasn't on insurance and it wasn't bothering me, so I let it pass. The receptionist scheduled me for today at 1pm. We figure we might as well get it done now.

Even so, I had no idea what was involved in a root canal process. After a little Internet research, I get the basic facts down and now understood why they wanted me to get one. If you want the details, just look it up. Anyways, today I go back in and first they do is get me an x-ray for the doctor (a different one than yesterday) to see what he need to accomplish. Apparently I am abnormal, my roots are extremely long. This made the procedure a lot longer. If that wasn't enough, apparently one of the roots was basically calcified, therefore, almost impossible to drill through. For that one, they purposely left the drill bit in there, had me go do another x-ray, so they could see how close to the end of the canal it actually was in comparison to the drill bit. Mind you, that was after he broke or wore down three other drill bits. What was supposed to be an hour long process ended up being two, with a dentist telling me he hasn't had one that difficult in a long time. GGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRR............. I have to go back in a week so they can put the crown on, they like to wait a week, in case there is anything they need to check on. That is a common practice from what I was reading. Seriously though, what was supposed to be a routine cleaning ends up like this? I have never been one to hate going to the dentist, but this has given me a reason to start.