With two hours to go until December, I am barely continuing my streak of consecutive months with a post. I could easily rattle off a million and one excuses for my absence of late, but that will just give away my future post topics. But, for those of you interested, here are a few reasons: a Wedding, homework, football game watching (I am currently pulling myself away from the Bears-Vikes game on Sunday Night Football), reading, church, visiting family etc etc. It's been a busy six weeks - no excuse for not writing of course, but I digress...
When it comes to automobile mechanics, I am certainly not in my element - which isn't anything new to those of you who truly know me. Although I have slowly become more adept at other kinds of "handy-man" skills, as soon as people start talking in their expert language of any kind - you know, in matters like wine, foreign countries, power tools, fantasy football, literature greats etc, I tend to slide into silent wonderment. The questions begin flying through my mind quickly and most times, so does the humor as I poke fun at myself for knowing so little of what these people are talking about. Then, for mere self entertainment, I become a professional yes man, pretending that I know exactly what they are saying - giving nods, laughs and affirmative quips to let them know that I'm following. So, I recently paid a visit to my new dentist - aka, the mouth mechanic - and I realize that this is no longer possible. I am like a inanimate car in the shop, hood wide open and unable to do anything but let 'em work. Then the questioning and investigation begins, and I'm given approximately 3 seconds to respond in between spitting into a vacuum tube and opening wide again. Many of you are now in yes man mode - you're following right?
The last 4 and a half years in Richmond, Virginia, I have had the most pleasurable dental visits of my life. Almost every visit I was practically worshiped - my timeliness and impeccable teeth were inspected and celebrated by the hygienists and dentists. They always told me to "keep up the good work" as I was in and out in 30 minutes or less. Yes, I could usually expect to be in a great mood after dentist appointments. This was new territory after all - my youth and bachelor years were marred with less than favorable marks. So, I have been kind of riding high as of late - feeling a tad invincible if you will. Then I went in last Wednesday, and I was brought back to square one in my first visit with the new guys.
My teeth still achieved high marks - which was a great start. I also scored a few bonus brownine points for having brought them my X-Rays from my previous dentist. Then my new hygienist sat me down and started the "counting test" of my gums. And so began the expert talk I described above - "1-1-2-3-3-3-2-3-3-3..." Some big words followed, then some more counting, then a few more words I was trying to decipher - you get the idea. What the heck is she talking about? I found myself rooting for my gums - "c'mon 1's and 2's..." Although I hadn't seen a key, I knew the higher the score got, the worse off I was. Just a hunch. Then she starting throwing out stuff like, "Bleeding spots" - and I knew we didn't want any of those. She also spotted my "abrasion" which occurred the day or two before when giving my mouth its pre-dentist appointment floss rehearsal. Some time ago, I decided to just be straight up with the dentist when the inevitable "How often do you floss?" question popped up. Now, I'm not saying I never floss - but I certainly don't floss as much as they recommend to. I think a few years ago they asked the dreaded question, and instead of beating around the bush and telling a white lie or two, I just fessed up and said "Today." To which she responded, "No, how often do you floss a week?" And I said again, "today." I at least made myself laugh. Anywho, back to the other day.
Just when I think I'm getting out of there with my new toothbrush and floss and the recommendation to floss more frequently, I get dropped with a bombshell. I am a moderate risk for gum disease?! I'm not brushing properly?! My gums are receding? They recommend to take out my other two wisdom teeth? Yeah - I definitely felt the wind in my sails deflate a tad more than expected. So my mechanics tell me that I've been brushing too hard, which has negatively affected my gums and due to my infrequent flossing in hard to reach areas, bacteria is having its way with my gums in those spots. To my credit, my useless wisdom teeth have made it very difficult on me and thus need to be extracted to save me from becoming a probable victim of gum disease - so, not a whole lot I could've done to avoid that. But the brushing technique/routine changes rocked my world. I've been coached in the art of tooth massage from now on - none of this "brush the hell out of my teeth" maneuvering - oh no - its all about circular motions and lifting from tooth to tooth, no more dragging. So those electric toothbrush users I've been mocking all these years have been right all along. I've been experimenting with this new method and I've got to say, I feel like I'm not doing anything constructive anymore. I'm simply not coordinated enough to adjust like this after all these years. I'm doing my best, but I don't like it.
Maybe this is a stretch here, but it dawned on me that perhaps we feel so resistant to change because it's simply too hard to switch gears after being programmed one particular way for so long. Change can suck. Here I've been a proponent of change for so long, but when it truly hits you where it hurts, everything finally comes into focus. I/we just have to tell ourselves that if asked or challenged to change for the right reasons, for better health, self-improvement, peace or societal welfare we need to stick with it no matter how uncomfortable/painful and awkward it feels. So, I am going to make these mouth routine changes - brushing better and flossing everyday so that come my next check-up, I'll be back on a gold star rampage.
