I have a toothache. It's pretty minor in terms of pain. I want to think it's entirely psychosomatic -- caused by the fact that yesterday I learned that my dental insurance at the new job has a twelve month wait for root canals. And root canals are both really expensive *and* my teeth's favorite procedure.
Seriously. Put a dental instrument near one of my teeth and it will begin to scream and ache within one week. My teeth won't stand for anything less than the whole deal.
Yes, the wait applies even though I signed up when I was first eligible.
I suspect I inherited my grandmother's teeth. My mother's mother's. Family lore is that way back when, before antibiotics, Grandma had toothaches and absesses galore. Which sounds familiar.
And so, when she was still a young woman, before my mother was born, Grandpa and the dentist decided that all of her teeth would eventually crap out on her and they should just go ahead and pull them. My grandmother woke up with no teeth. She never admitted to having dentures.
But I live in a more enlightened age. No one's pulling out my teeth without my say-so. And I have dental insurance. That will kick in and give me a break on a root canal in just one year. Between now and then, it'll just have to come out of my own pocket. I can afford it, especially if it means not being in pain. I just think it sucks.
I never had braces; I came with really straight teeth. They just happen to be crappy inside. Between the caps on my front teeth (entirely funded by Mom; I broke them when I was twelve), the whole complete surgical procedure that was my wisdom tooth "extraction", the molars I broke a few years ago, and the festival of dental fun that was 2005, I think at this point that braces would've been a steal comparatively. And one more root canal is not going to ratchet the figure up that much more.
