Mum and Dad How Could You?

This morning I lost a huge chunk of tooth from one of my back molars. It’s definitely due root canal treatment and fast.... which of course means big $$$$$. Up until this point in my life, I reckon I’ve easily spent $100,000 at the dentist. I have three titanium screws, and just about every tooth is a crown, and the majority have had root canals. I hate the bloody dentist for very good reason – I’ve got ample experience.

But why blame my parents? I don’t feel angry towards my parents for anything really. They were shambolic, but as Mum was 21 when she became a mother, and Dad 23, they were mere babies who hadn’t even sorted their own lives out before embarking on the quest of being role models to four very rambunctious children. I don’t speak for my siblings, but I think they did the best they could do with the life experience they had, and I’m appreciative of my childhood for many reasons.

With that said, my folks were of the 60s generation, when dreams of plastic homes (now fondly called McHouses), plastic food, and plastic lives became the norm, but also, most of the people they knew got plastic teeth. I always remember Mum or Dad’s falsies sitting in a glass of water in the bathroom or by the bed, and as you do, I figured when I grew up I’d naturally get falsies too. How could I not consider this a possibility when the two most prominent adults in my life had them? But dentists changed. They decided it was more important to save real teeth than take teeth out, and now, I don’t know of anyone getting falsies – a mouth of titanium screws sure, but not falsies.

Because my parents didn’t have teeth to worry about, and because I grew up in a town that didn’t have fluoride in the water (apparently), and because no one ever checked if we were ever brushing our teeth properly, and because my parents chose to have a two litre bottle of soft drink with EVERY meal, three out of four of us have expensive mouths to maintain. My older brother Paul got lucky. He had braces and the treatment – including regular fluoride tablets – has meant his teeth are good. Lucky bastard.

So here I am, facing a life-long challenge (and the expense) of maintaining my teeth, and if only we didn’t have that bloody soft drink every day? I am always appalled when I see very young children walking around with cans of Coke, or babies/toddlers drinking fruit juice from a bottle, and I want to say to the parents – don’t do it!! PLEASE, trust me! But it’s none of my business, and all I can do is work hard to ensure my lads have minimum sugary drinks and sweets, brush their teeth properly, educate them on how important it is to take care of their teeth and make them understand the potential long-term ramifications of not doing so. I’m planning on framing an X-ray of my teeth in their bathroom so they can see the consequences of bad dental hygiene. Hopefully it’ll do the trick or scare the shit out of them?

In the meantime, I’d better call the bloody dentist and prepare to empty the contents of my wallet directly into his account.

Yours, without the bollocks

Andrea