Dental Work

Today I went to visit the dentist. Apparently, after you get a kidney, they put you on medicine that "dumbs down" your immune system. Your body can't fight off disease very well, and your mouth is a good source of possible infection. So, they send you to a dentist to clean your teeth and make sure everything looks right. I had been to the dentist a little over a year ago when we first started this transplant process, but that was TOO long ago. I had to go again.

Dad had to drive me to dialysis this morning and the dentist this afternoon because I couldn't walk well. Yesterday, I stubbed one of the few toes I have left. I stubbed it good. It hurt bad. Basically, I injured the one good foot I have left at this point. I couldn't walk very far and my toe hurt really bad.

Anyway, dialysis went alright and now I was limping up the stairs to the dentists' office. As soon as I got in the door, they put me in a chair and started working. I don't mind the dentists nowadays. When I was a little kid and mom and dad made me go to the dentist, I HATED it! Nasty tasting floride. Bad background music. Uncomfortable chairs... Nowadays, with all the medical stuff I've been through, the dentist isn't intimidating at all. Actually, I find the dentist office quite relaxing. All I do is lay back and close my eyes, they do everything else.

I don't mind the sound of the drill. I don't mind the sound of them scraping my teeth. It does annoy me when they hook their sharp little, metal stick on a tooth and tug on it. That's something I would like to do myself, but letting someone else do it just doesn't feel right. I guess it's a control issue. Like a lot of tender parts of my deformed body, I trust myself to mess with it, but not someone else. Stay away from Mr. Stumpy! >:(

I wasn't at the dentists' office for long. They just scraped me and then polished me. (I felt like a car) Then it was all over. That was the last thing on my list before the transplant. If the transplant doesn't happen for a couple weeks, I've got another meeting to go to, but that's it. It feels kind of weird to be this close to a transplant. I'm not looking forward MORE time in a hospital bed, but I would love to have working kidneys. I guess it's not long now.