Had a Tooth Pulled Today

I had a tooth pulled today and I got the dentist to prescribe me some Tylenol with codeine. I'm not sure why I have been having such good luck with doctors lately. Usually around here it is extremely difficult to get any type of pain meds. But a few days ago I got a muscle relaxer and now I have Tylenol 3.

And it is working wonderfully. Unlike last time I had a tooth pulled, I am having no pain at all. I'm sleepy and getting ready to lie down for another nap. Whiskers is pleased with all day napping. But my mouth does not hurt one bit.

Isaac was great during the appointment.  I had to have an x-ray taken and he did a perfect down stay in the hall outside the door (which was left open), even though there were people walking around in the hallway.

It was a lovely day today and I am sure Isaac would have enjoyed a walk.  But I gave him a new beef knuckle bone to entertain him.  Whiskers finds napping on the couch with me entertainment enough.

Update on the Dental and Health Stuff

The dental work went well.  The most painful part of the procedure was injecting the novacaine.  A couple places where the needle had to go, it hurt.  But then I didn't feel anything during the procedure.  And it didn't take that long.

There were a couple moments where my PTSD was triggered a bit.  My jaw was starting to ache from having my mouth open so wide and the feel of the dentist's hand on my face was triggering.  I was able to push it away, to force myself back to the present.

I slept much of the afternoon.  Nothing about the procedure should have made me tired, yet I felt wrung out.  Whiskers curled up beside me and we slept off and on most of the rest of the day.

That was Wednesday.  Thursday I felt a little tired still but got a lot of stuff done.  Then Thursday night, I had nightmares.  I woke up for a while, managed to go back to sleep, had more nightmares.  Finally dragged myself out of bed, still tired, but not wanting to even try to sleep anymore.  And then Friday night was the same.  I'm guessing the nightmares were triggered by the dental procedure.  Hopefully I will be able to sleep better tonight.

The dizziness continues.  It seems to get worse in the evenings for some reason.  That's really the only pattern I've noticed.

I have an appointment later this month with an ENT.  Hopefully he has some ideas about it.

Dental Work Tomorrow

Tomorrow morning I have some dental work scheduled.  I'm expecting it to be painful but hopefully not horrible.  Hopefully I will recover relatively quickly.  But it's not just the recovery from the procedure itself, it's the way it may trigger my fibro pain and the way I expect it will trigger my PTSD.  Because dental stuff like this always does.

In the past, I've tried to get someone to go with me for procedures like this.  This time, I didn't bother to try.  I've had so much dental work done over the past year and a half, and I was able to get a friend to go with me one time, and a friend to come be with me at home afterward one other time, and that was it.  There was one other time a friend had agreed to come with me but then backed out at the last minute.

Isaac will go with me.  We have to go to the periodentology clinic at the dental college and he was wonderful on our first visit there.  I was horribly stressed out because it was ridiculously hard just to find the place and the appointment took forever, but Isaac was cool.

Today I went grocery shopping and I have protein shakes and herbal tea and ice cream, in case my mouth is sore, and because I figure a treat will be good.  I never buy ice cream.  Can't remember the last time I bought any.  But tomorrow I will have vanilla ice cream topped with warm apple butter and chopped pecans.

I also did some cleaning, straightened up the house, downloaded a new audio book to listen to, did everything I could think of to have things arranged to make myself comfortable while I recover.

Feels like it shouldn't be that big a deal for some fairly minor dental work.  But it is what it is.

Dental Work Went Pretty Well

I arrived at my dentist's office wet.  Yes, wet.  I took Isaac for a walk before the appointment, because a dog that has had some exercise is a better behaved dog, generally speaking.  After the walk, before going into the office, I offered Isaac some water.  Which he did not want.  And when I went to pour out the water, somehow I spilled most of it on me.  On my jeans and on my shirt.  So I was soggy when I got to the appointment. 

Isaac was good.  He sprawled out on the floor beside the dental chair and took a nap.  At one point he got up, I don't know why, and I had to tell him a couple times to lie back down.  Otherwise, he was fine. 

The dental assistant said she wished all dogs were as good as Isaac.  She didn't mean all service dogs, she just meant dogs in general.  I hear that kind of thing a lot.  Certainly not all dogs would make good service dogs, but probably all dogs could learn to behave well.  But it's not like service dogs are just born that way.  Most people don't want to spend the time and effort to train their dogs really well.

Anyway.  It wasn't painful at all.  The dentist shot me up with a lot of Novocaine.  The tooth that had to be pulled came out really easily.

Here's the weird thing.  The dentist was thinking when he pulled that tooth, we'd figure out what was causing so much trouble with the gum.  He thought he'd find a micro-fracture or maybe a teeny tiny piece of debris in the socket or something.  But there was nothing.  He said if someone just showed him that tooth, he'd ask why they pulled it.  It looked perfect.

He said what it really looked like to him, though he'd never seen or heard of this before, was like my body had just started rejecting the tooth.  He said it looked like the way my body would respond to some sort of foreign object in my mouth.  How weird is that?

But whatever.  I hope the problem is now solved.

They made this temporary appliance for me, like a partial denture, to wear until I get a new bridge.  Well, actually the dentist said if I preferred the partial, I could just use that and not get a new bridge.  The benefit would be that a new bridge would require grinding down a tooth to put a crown on it to anchor the bridge, and sticking with the partial would avoid having to do that to a tooth that is perfectly healthy and good right now. 

But I hate the partial.  I find it very, very uncomfortable.  I put it in this morning to go to the post office and the drug store but took it out as soon as I got home.  It hurts my mouth and feels really strange and I hate it.  Maybe I will get used to it in time and maybe it won't hurt so much when my mouth heals from having the tooth pulled, but it hurts in other places too, not just where the tooth was pulled.

It's sore today but I'm not in too much pain.  My friend John came over yesterday evening and it helped a lot having someone here.  Mostly I think he provided a good distraction from my mouth.  We just talked about stuff and then I was tired so we went to sleep for a while.  It was nice having someone there with me while I slept.  And he took Isaac out to pee so I didn't have to get up and go out in the cold.  Then he had to leave to go to work, but I was OK by myself for the rest of the night.

3 am and I'm Wide Awake

It's about 3 am and I'm wide awake. 

I have my dental work this afternoon.  About 11 hours from now, in fact.  And I'm anxious about it.

I'm doing all I can to prepare. 

I moved my regular tutoring session from Tuesday to  Monday so I don't have to go tutor after getting my tooth pulled.  The student's mom assured me that it would be OK to cancel Thursday, too, if I'm not feeling well by then.  I was like, "Oh, I better be feeling OK by then!"  Good grief, I don't wanna be in pain for three days!

It was kinda funny.  The little girl I'm tutoring is 10 years old but she has pretty significant learning disabilities, so she's more like a six-year-old, I'd say, socially.  She wanted to see my loose tooth and wanted to know if she could wiggle it.  So I let her.  First I got her to tell me what letter "tooth" starts with.  Sneak some learning in there whenever I can, you know!  Then she informed me she thought it was going to hurt a lot when they pull it.  I told her to shush and get back to her homework.

Anyway. 

I have protein shakes, yogurt, soup, homemade applesauce, lots of yummy soft and liquid stuff in case it hurts to eat.  I have my anxiety meds in my purse - I'll take one right before I get to the dentist's office so it should be kicking in by the time it's time for the procedure.  And I have my anxiety meds and Tylenol by the couch for when I get home.  I have Orajel by the couch, too.  I have my heating pad on the couch and I'm going to put my weighted blanket out here before I leave for the appointment.  I have an ice pack in the freezer.  My dishes are washed, my house tidied up.  I have some music I like on my MP3 player to listen to in the car.  I've got movies to watch on Netflix when I get home, while I lie on the couch.

I finished up the custom cloth menstrual pads a friend ordered and will stop by the post office to mail them before I go to the dentist.  I have some articles to write but those were just requested yesterday and I told my client I probably wouldn't be able to start on them until Wednesday or Thursday.  So there is no pressing work I have to do.  All I have to do is rest and recover until it's time to go tutor on Thursday.  And I have my tutoring materials ready for that session already.

A friend offered to come over after I get home from the dentist and spend the evening with me.  It's someone I'm sort of dating.  We haven't known each other real long and I wasn't sure I wanted him to see me when I was feeling anxious and unwell, but I like him and I trust him and he really seemed to want to be here for me.  So I said OK.

Mike was going to stop by when he gets off work but I told him he doesn't need to since my other friend is coming over.  But Mike said I could call him if I changed my mind,  he'll be available.

My other friend will probably actually be more helpful, though.  He will do stuff like take Isaac out to pee for me if I don't feel like getting up and taking him out.  When I had the biopsy of my gum done a few months ago, I remember I ended up taking a double dose of my anxiety meds, which pretty much zonked me out for a few hours, because that was the only thing I could think of to do to cope with the pain.  I may end up doing that again, but I'd feel better about doing it with someone else here with me to take Isaac out and stuff.

I think I've done all I can do to prepare but I still feel really anxious.

Dental Work Scheduled for Next Week

Tuesday I am going to have my loose tooth pulled and get a temporary bridge put in.  Then they will schedule a date to put a crown on the tooth that will support the one end of my new bridge, but my mouth will need a week or two to heal before that.  I am hoping the extraction goes easily.  It is being done by my regular dentist, I don't have to go to an oral surgeon for it.  I'm anxious, though.

This kind of thing really triggers my PTSD.  I'm worried about how much pain I might have afterward. Also, I stopped taking my turmeric in preparation for the procedure, because it can lead to excessive bleeding.  So I'll be turmeric-free for several days before the procedure, which will probably make my back pain and arthritis and stuff worse.

I am glad it will be getting done, because this tooth is really bothering me.  But I just hate to deal with the PTSD and anxiety and pain.

At Least There is a Little Good News

The dentist said my bridge absolutely should not have cracked and that the company that makes it should pay for a replacement. 

He just kept looking at my mouth and shaking his head.  It's never good when a medical professional does that.

He thinks the root of the loose tooth, the one with the crown, is probably fractured.  It is going to have to be pulled.  Which is bad news. 

But he thinks the company that made the bridge should pay for all related costs of repairing my mouth, so they should pay to pull that tooth and to make a bigger bridge, not just to make a duplicate of the one that has cracked.  He said he needs to call the company and talk to a supervisor and they are on the west coast so he couldn't do that while I was at his office, but he said his office would be calling me in a day or two to schedule stuff once he gets the OK from the bridge company.

I feel very relieved that I am not going to have to pay for all of this.  That at least makes it easier to deal with.

More Dental Problems

And I am having more dental problems.  Or continuing dental problems, I guess.

My gum never returned to normal, although it finally did get kind of close to normal.  It took forever to heal from the biopsy and remains slightly sore and swollen to this day.  I think that biopsy was, what, three months ago?

Well, there were two teeth, one with a crown on it that is attached to my bridge, and the one next to it, that were somewhat loose.  And the one without a crown is now barely loose.  It seems to have improved.  But the one with a crown? 

Well, early this morning, my bridge cracked.  I think it cracked because the tooth attached to it has been wiggly for so many months.  I think that created stress on the bridge and it finally cracked.

And now the tooth with a crown on it is super, super loose.  Like it feels like it could just fall out.  Not just the crown falling off, but the whole tooth falling out.

So I have to go to the dentist tomorrow.  I am not looking forward to it.  I'm afraid I'm going to be told I need a new bridge, which of course I cannot afford.  I'm afraid they are still not going to be able to figure out what's causing the problem with my gum.  I've pretty much given up on getting an answer to that.  But that means they don't know how to treat it, either.  I'm afraid they're going to do something that hurts.  It hurts now.  I'm afraid they're going to tell me the tooth needs to be pulled and I'm afraid that will be expensive and that I won't be able to get anyone to go with me so I won't be able to be sedated for it even though the oral surgeon recommended I be sedated and I'm afraid it will hurt.  I'm afraid I won't be able to get pain medication if I need it.

I'm trying not to be afraid tonight.  I don't need to worry about it tonight.  There's nothing I can do about it tonight and I don't need to worry about it until tomorrow.  But I'm anxious.  And I am so tired of dental problems.

You Know That "Dentist Office" Smell?

Yesterday I went to the dentist.  My regular dentist.  To see if he agreed with the periodontist that I do not have advanced periodontal disease or with the oral surgeon that I do have advanced periodontal disease and need to have two teeth removed.

Nice man, he said I do not have periodontal disease and he would not remove any teeth.  He said oral surgeons just like to pull teeth because that's what they do.  So I called the oral surgeon and left a message with his receptionist, explaining that I would not be scheduling any tooth extractions and why.  I really hope she passed it on to the surgeon.

I love my dentist.  He did not even charge me for the appointment.

Isaac was really good.  He was lying on his side, snoozing away during the whole appointment.

You know that dentist office smell?  Well, as the dentist was examining my mouth and Isaac was snoozing away, suddenly, that dentist office smell was replaced with a most foul and offensive odor.  Isaac had farted.

The nice dentist pretended not to notice. 

Update on the State of My Mouth

I saw the oral surgeon today, who told me I have "advanced periodontal disease" and two teeth need to come out.  He said there is no saving them.

I asked how come the periodontist I just saw two days ago wasn't able to diagnose advanced periodontal disease and he said "I don't know.  That's a good question."

He advises removing the two teeth ASAP and strongly recommends doing it under general anesthesia because of the degree of infection and inflammation.  He said if I really wanted, he would do it under a local with me awake, but he suspects it will be very painful because the infected, inflamed tissue won't numb properly.  Well, I'd rather be out anyway, except it costs more and I have to have someone to drive me.  They want me to have someone stay with me for 12 hours after the procedure, but there is simply no way that will happen.  I might - might - be able to get someone to drive me rather than take a cab but they would probably just drop me off at home.  Maybe come in with me for a few minutes but not for 12 hours.  But OK, I just wouldn't tell the surgeon that.

After removing the two teeth, I can get a bridge or dental implants.  Except I can't, because I cannot afford it.  There is no way I can possibly afford it.  Maybe in a year or two, but not now.  So I would have a big gap in my teeth in the front of my mouth.  Which normally would bother me but I don't even care that much right now because I just want my mouth to stop hurting and want to be able to eat again.

But I was really confused because not only did the periodontist that I saw two days ago not diagnose advanced periodontal disease, but neither did my regular dentist that I saw maybe six weeks ago.  And when I had my teeth cleaned 11 months ago (Medicaid only pays for it once a year, not every six months), my dentist said my gums were "in great shape."  How can you develop such advanced periodontal disease in less than one year?

So after I left the oral surgeon, I called the periodontist to tell him what the surgeon said.  He said he absolutely disagrees, that he saw absolutely no sign of periodontal disease (advanced or otherwise) in my mouth.  He does not know what is causing the inflammation and pain and stuff, but feels certain it is not periodontal disease.  He does not think the two teeth need to come out.

Well, so far I have seen three physicians and spent $1,146 out of my pocket, and I am still in pain, still cannot eat any solid food, and still don't even know what is wrong with me.

I called my regular dentist to ask what he thought and am waiting for him to call me back.

The oral surgeon also thought the infection was really bad and he prescribed two different antibiotics for that.  So I will start taking those today (it's a total of eight pills a day, ugh) and try to figure out what to do.  I am so frustrated!

I Feel Like My Body Just Doesn't Work Like It's Supposed To

Of course, fibromyalgia is pretty much a body not working like it's supposed to.

But it's more than that.  Today I saw the periodontist again, follow up from my surgery and biopsy two weeks ago.

I am still having a lot of pain and there is still a lot of swelling and inflammation.  I knew things weren't right.

The periodontist confirmed that.  That was good, at least.  Too many times I've been told doctors couldn't find anything wrong, like with my back.  I hate being told something shouldn't hurt as much as it does and stuff like that.  I asked the periodontist if he could see the swelling in my mouth and he said, "Of course I can see that!"  He confirmed that something is definitely wrong, that there is much more swelling than there should be at this point, and that things are not healing like they should.

He just doesn't know why.

So now I have to go see an oral surgeon.  The periodontist said he thinks the surgeon will probably want to do a CT scan and then maybe another biopsy of a different area of my mouth.

I am not happy.  Not happy at all.

I see the surgeon on Friday.

I have no idea how I'm going to pay for all this.  My insurance might cover the CT scan, but won't cover the oral surgeon. 

And I am tired of my mouth hurting and tired of living on protein shakes, yogurt, pudding and applesauce.

And even though I know it's not my fault, I feel kind of like it is.  Like I'm doing something wrong.  Like it's my fault my body isn't working like it's supposed to.

How Did My Dental Surgery Go?

Ugh.  And ouch.  I think that about sums it up.

But if you want to know more, well, first of all, I was exhausted on Wednesday because Monday night Cayenne kept me up a good bit of the night puking and then Tuesday night I was too anxious about the surgery to sleep well.  So I was exhausted.

I did not take Isaac with me, for two reasons. 

One, it's my understanding that medical people generally don't want a dog in the room when they are doing surgery because they want things to be as clean and sterile as possible.  Now, this was dental surgery and it was done in the same room I had my exam the previous week, not in an operating room, but still, the dentist and the assistant wore masks and gloves and you can't put a mask on a dog.  It is allowable under the Americans with Disabilities Act to exclude service dogs for this reason.  However, as soon as I got there the assistant asked me where my dog was and assured me it would have been no problem having him there.  Well, now I know for next time.

But the other reason I didn't take him was because it's hard to talk and give commands to a dog when someone is performing surgery inside your mouth.  I did not feel comfortable trusting Isaac to hold a down stay for an hour without needing to maybe tell him at some point to lie back down.  And I didn't trust myself to be able to pay enough attention to him, either, to even notice when he was starting to get up or something.  I knew I would be very focused on what was happening in my mouth and on dissociating from what was happening in my mouth, and as smart as Isaac is, he is also aware of when I'm not paying attention to him and is not above trying to sneak in a sniff of something he's not supposed to sniff or sneakily soliciting a pet from somebody.  I definitely did not want my dog distracting my dentist while he was operating on my mouth!

So I didn't take him.  I did take my weighted blanket.  I always feel sort of weird settling into the dental chair with my blankie, but you know, whatever it takes to get through it.  I explained to the assistant what it was and how it was supposed to help with anxiety.  She was not familiar with weighted blankets but said she liked the idea.  She said she likes to be under very heavy blankets. 

The actually surgery itself was not bad.  It took less than an hour and he gave me tons of novacaine.  I did not feel a thing.

Unfortunately, the tons of novacaine began to wear off when I was almost home and by the time I got inside my apartment, I was in tears.  As I'd feared, the aftermath was worse than the actual surgery.  The pain was really bad.  A lot worse than my dental surgery last fall.  However, unlike the surgery last fall, it didn't trigger flashback of having my arms stapled.  The severe pain did cause a lot of anxiety, though.  Panic, really, I would say.  I cried a lot.  I wanted to sleep but was in too much pain.  I also felt feverish, although I took my temperature and it was actually slightly below normal.  But I was freezing cold; it was 78 degrees in my apartment and I was only warm enough when I was under two blankets. 

Fortunately, I felt a lot better by the next day.  Now, three days later, the pain is pretty minimal most of the time as long as I don't try to eat.  At times it starts to ache a lot but Tylenol is sufficient to reduce that pain.  But eating... I am starving.  I've been living on protein shakes, mostly.  I had some tomato soup yesterday and today I had broccoli cheddar soup from Panera, although I didn't eat much of the actual chunks of broccoli.  I can eat yogurt but honestly, I lot some crunchy stuff in my yogurt, but that hurts too much to eat right now.  I also really like chia seeds in my yogurt, but those tend to get stuck in my teeth, and there is no way I could floss right now.  Today I baked some diced apples with Splenda, cinnamon and nutmeg, and I cooked them until they were really, really soft, and that was yummy.  But I'm still hungry and wish I could eat actual food.

I've been napping a lot the past few days.  Recovering, I guess.

The periodontist said he was surprised to find nothing abnormal or unusual during the surgery.  He thought he might find some sort of debris under the skin of my gum, like a tiny food particle or even just a lot of tartar buildup.  But there was nothing.  So he did a biopsy.  It will take seven to 10 days to get those results back.

I Have to Have Oral Surgery

I have to have oral surgery next week on my gum.

I've been dealing with a problem area in the gum behind one of the crowns that was put in for my bridge last fall for a couple of months now.  Since early to mid May, I guess.  I tried ignoring it for a while and when it didn't get better, finally gave in and went to my dentist.

I really like my dentist.  I had having to go to the dentist, any dentist, but I do like mine.

He tried a couple things and couldn't figure out what was causing the problem, so I had to go see a periodontist.  Which of course Medicaid will not pay for.  Apparently I have some sort of weird infection and a lot of inflammation and I have to have surgery to clean out the infection and also he is going to do a biopsy just to make sure nothing more serious is going on.  Of course neither Medicaid nor Medicare will pay for the surgery, but Medicare will pay for the pathologist to examine the tissue specimen taken from the biopsy.  Isn't that nice of them?

I am stressed.  I am more stressed about the idea of having to have surgery than about the money, which tells you how much this sort of thing triggers my anxiety and PTSD, since it is going to cost me $950.  $950 which of course I do not have.  I had to borrow it from a friend.  I have no clue how or when I will be able to pay him back.

And it's bad timing because there is all sorts of financial stress going on already, which I haven't written too much about.  I did mention that I had to start paying my Medicare premiums, which are $105 a month, and that this extra expense should cause my rent to go down a bit.  Well, I am still waiting for that to go into effect.  The reduced rent, I mean.  Paying the Medicare premiums started in July.  But my rent did not go down yet.  But on top of that, my freelance writing income has decreased and when I reported the changes to the state welfare department, they did something goofy and decreased my food stamps and increased my  Medicaid spend down, which is the opposite of what should have happened.  It will be fixed but it is a huge pain and is taking a while to fix.  So financially, things suck right now.

But surgery.  On my mouth.  It's triggering and I am stressed.

Doggie at the Doctors

For quite a while, I did not like taking Isaac to medical appointments with me.

That was mostly after a couple of bad experiences with him at therapy appointments soon after I got him.  During one visit, he barked so much I had to cut the appointment short.  It was frustrating and embarrassing.  After that, I was worried about taking him to medical appointments.

Sometimes it takes a long time to get in to see certain doctors.  For instance, if I have to cancel an appointment with my psychologist or rheumatologist at the last minute, it's usually a good month before they can get me in again.  I was worried that if Isaac started barking or otherwise behaving in appropriately in the waiting room and I had to leave, it would take a long time to get another appointment.

Also, many doctors seem to charge a fee if you cancel with less than 24 hours notice.  So if I had to leave before actually seeing the doctor, not only might I have to wait several weeks or more to get another appointment, I might also have to pay something.

And when I'm at a doctor's appointment, I need to be able to pay attention to what the doctor is telling me.  I need to remember to ask all my questions and request medication refills and whatever else I need to do there.  It's hard to do that if I am being distracted by a dog that is not behaving the way a well-trained service dog should.  And doctors are usually in a hurry. They don't want to sit quietly, waiting for me to get my dog to lie down, before they ask me questions or examine me or do whatever it is they need to do.

So for a long time, I didn't take him to most appointments.

Recently, I've began taking him a lot more.  We had a very successful appointment with the rheumatologist, in which Isaac behaved beautifully (even though the rheumatologist was afraid of him).  Then I took him to the dentist with me a couple weeks ago and he did great there.

A few days ago, I took him to the hospital with me to get blood drawn.  We went very early in the morning since I couldn't eat before getting the blood drawn, so Isaac was still sleepy.  Typically, he gets up early, I take him out to pee, I feed him, and then we both go back to bed.  But this day, after he finished eating, we went to the hospital.  He spent most of the time there sleeping.  He slept beside my chair while I was at the registration desk, slept at my feet in the waiting room, and slept on the floor near my chair while the phlebotomist was drawing the blood.  He showed absolutely no interest whatsoever in what was going on.

Then yesterday, I took him with me to see the periodontist.  He was absolutely great there, too.  When they took an x-ray, I had Isaac do a down stay right outside the door.  I couldn't hold the leash from that distance, but I could see him and he could see me and hear me.  At one point the x-ray tech walked past him and he stood up then, but he lay back down when I told him to.  As soon as they were done taking the x-ray, I called him and he came right over to me and handed me his leash when I told him to.

He has been a very good doggie at doctors lately.

Doggie at the Dentist

The other day I had to go to the dentist.  I've been having dental issues, which are currently still unresolved.  I need to go see a periodontist, which I don't think my Medicaid will cover, which means I'll have to pay out of pocket, and I'm betting it will be expensive, so I don't want to go.  Well, that's not the only reason I don't want to go, but it is a big reason.  But I think I am going to have to because my mouth hurts and it's hard to eat.

Anyway.  I usually don't take Isaac to the dentist with me.  Actually, I never have before.  I think I would have a hard time maintaining control of him while the dentist is messing around in my mouth, because I wouldn't be able to issue verbal commands, and I'm not sure he'd really be able to see my hands well when I'm lying back in the dental chair in order to give hand signals instead of verbal commands (I don't have hand signals for all his commands, but I do for the most common ones, like sit and lie down).  I wasn't even sure where I'd put him, because usually the dentist sits on one side of the chair and the assistant sits on the other, so where would I put Isaac that he wouldn't be in the way but I could still hold his leash and he could see my hands for hand signals?  So I never took him in the past.

But I knew this was going to be a very quick visit.  The dentist was just going to look in my mouth, tell me my gum still looked inflamed, and tell me I was going to need to see a periodontist.  I knew that was what was going to happen, and that is in fact exactly what happened.  I was feeling pretty anxious, though, and wanted to have Isaac with me.  And I thought it would work out OK since it would be such a quick visit.

And Isaac did fantastic.  I was so proud of him.

I should also say that my dentist and his staff did fantastic, too.  The receptionist didn't say anything about Isaac when she say him.  The dental assistant that led me from the waiting room to the exam room didn't say anything about him, either.  When the dentist walked in, he said, "I see you brought a body guard."  That, by the way, is the same thing he said when I brought a friend with me when I had all the work done for my bridge.  The exact same thing.  Other than that, he ignored Isaac.

I think all that ignoring by the dentist and staff made it easier for Isaac to do a good job.  He sprawled out in the waiting room and snoozed (and drooled) while waiting for us to be called back.  He lay down where I told him in the exam room.  The dental assistant was opening some packages of tools and he raised his head up and looked like he was thinking of getting up, but put his head back down when I told him to.  When the dentist came in, he did the same thing, raised his head and looked like he was thinking about getting up.  But again, he put his head back down when I told him to.  Other than that, he just lay there with his head on his paws, quiet and still.

I know there were tons of interesting new smells in that place and I was very proud of him for not trying to sniff everything.  As a reward, I let him spend a long time sniffing the parking lot when we left.  He found it pretty interesting, too.  He's weird that way.