Stagefright

"Your teeth," my dentist tells me with a shake of his head and a distressed expression, " are supposed to last a lifetime."

"That," I say as I always do when he tells me this, "was when people only lived to be 35."

He sighs, reaches for an instrument, a syringe, and the nitrous.

I am a great trial to him, always have been. He works amazingly hard to save my teeth and though my intentions are always the best, I never live up to them. I am also more than a trifle phobic about dentist visits and he's worked with me for years to overcome this fear - his success has been limited and a less caring man would've written me off years ago -

Dental hygiene was something less of a priority when I was growing up and the first time I saw a dentist, I was twelve. His office was on the 6th floor of a building just outside Central Square in Cambridge and the chair faced the street. Through the blinds I could read the lettering of the businesses across the street. The one I remember because it was on the 6th floor and directly in my line of sight was a ballet school. My mother left me in the dusty waiting room - I could hear the sounds of drilling and other noises that I didn't recognize and the whole place reeked of antiseptic.

Dr. Fishman was a fairly large man with white hair, black framed glasses, a stained labcoat and Parkinson's. When he spoke his voice was overloud and threatening and he smelled of the same nasty antiseptic as the waiting room. I began to be afraid, of what I wasn't sure, but I could feel fear beginning to churn in my belly like stagefright. Nicotine stained hands with too long nails began poking and prodding inside my mouth with sharply pointed, wicked looking instruments. I drew in a breath and the air hit my teeth like a hammer, sending pain flaring into my jaws. I jumped in surprise and agony and tried to close my mouth in protest and he snapped at me to "Grow up! Behave!" I started to struggle and he leaned in closer and pressed one arm against my throat until I gagged. "Think of something else!" he growled at me and all I could think of was dying. "Breathe! he ordered and took his arm away. He picked up a syringe and I thought she's left me with a monster and he's going to kill me.

The local punctured my gums and I could suddenly taste salt and blood together and then something vile and metallic. I couldn't breathe and couldn't hear for the roaring in my ears. When I opened my eyes, the old man was looking at me with a satisfied smirk. My heart was pounding impossibly loud and way too fast and with a sick, defeated feeling, I realized there was nowhere to go. When I refused to open my mouth again, he grabbed my jaws and pressed and the pressure woke up the sleeping pain in my back teeth. He reached for a drill and with badly shaking hands he came at me. There was a lot of blood which he ordered me to "Spit!" and each puff of air brought a wave of fresh and raging pain. At some point, little points of light danced in front of my eyes and I thought maybe I would lose consciousness and wake up when it was over but then those shaking hands would miss their target and pierce my gums or my cheek.

After twelve years of neglect, the nightmare had only just begun. I begged, pleaded, cried not to be taken back but I wasn't believed. "He's a good enough dentist for me," my mother said acidly, "and he's good enough for you." She would haul me into the waiting room and then leave. Like Pavlov's dog, it wasn't long before I associated every sound and smell of that office with torture. I carried all that terror into adulthood and even when I discovered dentists that were kind, gentle, patient and understanding, the moment I stepped into their offices, old reflexes kicked in.

My current dentist, though I suspect he despairs of me, refuses to give up. He worries, he cares, he has a gentle soul and an even gentler nature. He was made to help people just like me. If current kindnesses could cure past horrors we'd all be so much better off.