The Worst Dentist EVER: Part 1

During Spring Break {so WAAAY back at the beginning of March} Ben decided that we needed to finally go and see the dentist.  Neither one of us had been to the dentist since we came home from serving our missions {so about 5 years ago}.  Why had it been so long?  Well our number one reason was because we didn't have dental insurance and it cost about an arm and a leg to get your teeth cleaned {especially for two poor college students}.

We finally got dental insurance when we moved to Texas, so it was time to go in and get our teeth cleaned/checked.  Unfortunately there was only one dentist office that our insurance allowed us to go to in the area.

Ben went first not knowing how HORRIBLE this experience was going to be.

After waiting for over an hour they finally took Ben back to do his x-rays and to clean his teeth.  Once they had finished the x-rays the dentist came in to inspect Ben's mouth.  She started by taking her hook and doing something called probing.  Well this dentist wasn't doing the normal probing she was sticking Ben really hard with her hook and making his gums bleed.  She then told him that he had really bad bacteria all around his gums and that the bacteria was causing the bleeding around his gums {according to her, it had nothing to do with the fact that she was poking him with her hook}.  The dentist then went on to tell Ben that they needed to give him this "special mineral water" to get rid of all the bacteria in his mouth.

Ben told the dentist thanks but he did NOT want to swish with their "special water" and that he understood all of the dangers that came with not rinsing with their "special water".  Ben then asked then dentist to just do the regular cleaning that our insurance covered.

This is where this story gets a little ridiculous.  The dentist then told Ben that he HAD to rinse with their "special water".  Ben said thank you again but that he would just like the regular cleaning that our insurance covered.  The dentist then said again that he HAD to have this "special water" and that if she didn't give it to him, it was malpractice and that she could lose her license.  Ben asked her if that was a Texas law or a nation-wide law.  The dentist told Ben that it was a nation-wide law.  Ben told the dentist that that was bogus because when we had lived in Idaho his wife had gone in to see a dentist to fill a couple of cavities but that she didn't get all of her cavities filled.

There was no way that she could lose her license for not giving Ben the "special water".  The dentist then told Ben and I quote, "When your wife comes in tomorrow we will make sure that she signs a contract to fill all of those cavities with us."  And then she insisted again that Ben had to swish with the "special water".

Ben was losing it at this point.  He told the dentist that she was not to have his wife sign a contract the next day for anything.  Then to appease this very pushy dentist he told her that he would swish her "special water" but he only wanted it for half of his mouth {they charge you per quadrant of the mouth and it's kind of ridiculously expensive}.  This seemed to satisfy the dentist so Ben swished their "special water" and then they proceeded to clean Ben's teeth, which according to Ben it was the WORST cleaning he had ever gotten in his life.

When Ben came home and told me how lovely his experience was I was NOT looking forward to going to the dentist the next day.  If you think what they did to Ben was bad, wait until you hear what they made me do!