I used to have this fear in my life - seeing a dentist. I do not know whether it was because of the painful and nasty experiences I had when I was schooling. I remember the school dentist was always fierce, angry and blaming us for not brushing our teeth so she had a hard time cleaning them up. In those days, the technology was not so advanced, hence the dentist had to use a sharp scalpel to scrap out all the tartar and plaque. It was a horrible and painful experience. Not only was it unpleasant, I often times felt condemned because my teeth were always so dirty. And so as I grew up, I had an aversion to dentists and I told myself to stay away from them whenever possible.
In my adult life, I again had a nasty experience with dentists. That time I had to let a dentist extract my imbedded wisdom tooth if not it would cause me problems in future. What happened was the anesthetic wore off towards the tail end of the surgery and I could feel the dentist sewing up my gums. The recovery process was also painful and I cried out to God asking why I had to go through this painful surgery. Well, as I grew, I would delay my visits to the dentists as much as possible. I only visited the dentist once in a few years. The last time I went three years ago, the dentist gave me a shock when he told me that one of my upper wisdom tooth was decayed beyond repair and had to be pulled out. He wanted to pull out my tooth there and then but I refused. I didn't feel any pain or discomfort so why should I take out my tooth? I didn't quite believe what he told me. And so I left it as such.
But as the years passed, I often have this niggling fear that what he said was true, yet I did not dare visit another dentist because I did not want them to tell me to extract my tooth. So when I started having gum infections, swollen gums and gum pain, my fears were confirmed, yet I did nothing about it. Every time I had gum infection I would believe God to heal my gums and when the pain was gone, I would put this issue aside and try not to think about it. But this problem recurred once in a while and I also started feeling sensitive about drinking hot and cold stuff. I knew that I had decayed teeth but I still didn't want to face my fears.
Until June this year, I brought Joshua to his dental visit in school. The dentist complimented him, saying that it was so brave of him to put up with the extensive scaling since it was his first time. Then after I saw how clean his teeth became, I suddenly found the motivation to see a dentist. Somehow this time round, the motivation of getting my teeth cleaned outweighed the fear of extracting my teeth. I told myself even if the dentist said to extract my teeth, I would be mentally prepared. I wanted to get down to the root of my recurring gum infection. If my tooth was badly decayed, I rather have it out of my mouth than to leave it there to cause problems in future.
And so I finally did visit the dentist last Monday and she extracted two decayed wisdom tooth. It was rather painless and my gums recovered the next day. I really thank God for helping me overcome this fear and I was really relieved when my teeth were extracted. Finally this cannot cause me pain in future. I couldn't have my teeth cleaned last Monday so I went back for another appointment yesterday. It was a little painful when she was cleaning the tartar but I was happy when the whole process was over. Finally I got it out of the way and I not only got clean teeth, The Lord also restored the pain and stigma of visiting a dentist and I overcome this fear. Praise Jesus!
