I think she is working on his milk-teeth.
… I’ll get my coat.
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I’m lucky that I’ve never had a bad experience at a dental surgery. Pre-teens I had a dentist when I lived in Lincolnshire called Mister Gibson. I remember having seven teeth out; four by being gassed, two more by being gassed, and one under local anaesthetic.
All calm, and most importantly, painless.
In my teens, my dentist in Yorkshire was a Mister Terry, who was a comedian, but only to patients he knew could take his type of humour.
There were stains on a couple of ceiling tiles caused by a leaking roof, but he said they were caused by blood splatter from a previous victim.
Other comments would be along the lines of, “Don’t worry, I scraped the rust off the instruments before you arrived,” or,
“I sharpened the syringe needles on the doorstep when I left home.”
When I moved to Somerset I did actually enjoy visiting the dentist, but that was because I got to snog the young nurse before walking her home. She actually filled one of my teeth when I needed a filling replaced. Ain’t love grand!
I’ve worked my way through several dentists since then, always as an NHS patient. I’ve only had to have remedial work done to repair previous fillings and a crown, plus the odd wash and brush up, but always by the dentist, never a hygienist.
I suppose my good experiences when I was little, and when I was growing up have helped me to have no fear of subsequent visits in my dotage.
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Mrs Fox visited her dentist after giving birth to our daughter. She exclaimed to the dentist that she didn’t know which was worse, having a baby or having a tooth out…The dentist replied…“Make up your mind, I’ve tools for both”… 
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@Aniseknow the feeling…I wouldn’t have gone except it turns out I had an inflamed nerve in one of my teeth. I thought it was a cavity… takes me a day to recover from my body’s reaction to dental work…
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I personally love going to the dentist. Having a career where I help people all day, it feels really good to have someone taking care of me. I work with a lot of people who have dentures and I have a personal goal to keep all of my teeth. Regular trips to the dentist is the only way that’s going to happen.
Just a thought,
Ken
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It’s not as easy as that in the UK Ken.
If people haven’t much spare brass, going to the dentist is way down on their list of priorities.
Dentists on the NHS are in short supply, and it still costs quite a bit for fillings, descale, clean and polish. And if you go to a private dentist it will cost you a kings ransom that only the well off can afford.
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Mrs mart and I went to the dentist this morning. I pulled up across the road to the building and went to the back of the car to get the power wheelchair out. It was without thinking because I’d put the smaller manual wheelchair in the sliding side door. Just habit made me go straight to the tailgate I suppose.
With the tailgate up, I realised the mistake and pulled it back down. The trouble was that I didn’t stand far enough back. The tailgate went down onto my nose and scraped a good deal of skin off it. So with blood dripping from the wound and somewhat shocked, I got the manual wheelchair out of the side door, helped Mrs mart to transfer into it and then wheeled her across the road and into the dentist.
The receptionist kindly got the first aid kit out and Mrs mart patched up the damaged nose best she could. It provided a good show for others in the waiting room who were politely trying to take no notice. Mrs mart and me eventually went into the surgery together. I had my check-up with the sore patched-up nose.
All in all, I had good reason not to like going to the dentist today.
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Sorry to hear about your nose Mart, I can see me doing the same thing before long. I reversed into a garden centre and opened the boot from inside the car to put my coat in there. Before I could stop the lid from opening it had jammed into the bushes at the back of the car. There is a lot to be said for opening the boot manually like in the old days.
It will teach me to think more of what has to be done instead of relying on automatic pilot. Adds a different meaning to being tailgated 
We’re both back to the dentist on Monday. There will not be a repeat performance.
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Made my terrified visit to the Dentist this morning for my check up. Woe is me! I have to go back for a filling. Fortunately I was able to postpone that for a week because I am off to Canberra tomorrow.
I always laugh when they present the bill because you know it is going to be $150 (£75) but they have to make a song and dance about it with discounts etc
I have to say my dentist is really nice I think he is Lebanese but they are a mixed bunch of Indian, Pakistani and Middle Eastern doctors. In an emergency I would see any of them they are great.
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I don’t mind going to the Dentist. Our previous dentist was excellent and NHS. He then went private and we looked around for another NHS dentist but it took nearly 2 years to find one and that was a stroke of luck.
So we now have a Bulgarian dentist and he is very nice and quite gentle. He is picking up English very well know and I have taught him a few words in a Norfolk accent. 
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We both just had some work done subsequent to an earlier check-up. Mrs mart had a couple of teeth coated with something or other to build up the contour. I had a clean-up. Total cost for both of us was £141.00. Not too bad.
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We hardly have any NHS dentist here now !!
Ive always been private , as there wasnt much different in the prices
Im not sure what the difference is now ,
But im happy with dentist …
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I never used to go to the hygienist because i didn’t think that i needed to go. But my gums got so bad with gum disease that i had to go and be told how to use the T-P brushes for in-between my teeth. But i don’t look forward to the cleaning because my teeth are very sensitive now.
I can still get NHS treatment but chose to go private because my dentist went private and i wanted to stay with him because he’s a very good dentist.
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I’m actually going tomorrow for a load of fillings since I haven’t been since before Covid. He found a bad tooth and recommended either extraction or root canal work…After I did some research, he can forget about the root canal work. my teeth are over 70 years old and I only need them to last me another 20 years if I’m lucky, and for some of that I will probably need my food liquidizing so not much need for teeth by then…
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I remember my late SIL having root canal treatment and it sounded pretty awful. I think I would be the same as you!
As long as your front teeth look OK, I wouldn’t bother.
Mind you my friend’s husband told the dentist to just take his tooth out as he was 75 and be done with it. The dentist insisted he could save it. He got it out but he looks awful as it’s right in the front. He says he doesn’t care.
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Mine is at the back Rose, so I don’t expect people will see it but I still use it to chomp so the jury is still out on the Root Canal Work…
I started to feel a bit of a twinge in one of my molars where a root filling I had a while ago went a bit wrong, although it felt like a tooth going bad under a filling. Phone the emergency dentist and was told they don’t accept NHS emergency work unless you phone a number first and triage the issue over the phone and then wait for a call from a local dentist for you to take a look at it. I then asked to see one privately and was in the chair inside an hour. One Xray and a prescription for antibiotics later, I was back at home and forty quid lighter (which hurt more than my tooth). Luckily it all cleared up, but was told the tooth will have to come out at sometime as there is bone loss around it. That can wait for another day!
Bowels and Teeth seem to be two of the major vexations in the ageing process…
