Dentists, anxiety, and escapism

 

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If I as a carrot-top at twelve ....

ad a nine o’clock appointment with an endodontist today. Groan—everyone knows what that means. It was double jeopardy because I am so self-indulgent about my sleep these days. Sophie got me up at 6:45, but on a normal day, I would have gone back to sleep for an hour or more. Today I didn’t dare.

I confess that I am dental phobic, but I think if you are my age and you had much dental work done as a youngster, you probably feel the same way. When I was twelve or around there, I had multiple cavities—and today I still sport some gold crowns from those days. Our dentist was a shirt-tail relative, Uncle Walt. When I was grown, I came to love Uncle Walt but when I was young, he frightened me—he was taciturn which is something I hadn’t encountered before. And the drill in those days was loud and slow and clumsy. Dentistry has come a long way. But my memories have not kept pace.

When I called for this appointment, I was asked if I wanted a consultation or a procedure. No brainer there—a consultation. I wanted to check out my options. I liked the dentist a lot immediately. He was open, friendly, understanding—and unbending.

Dr. Yeltsin: Did someone tell you that you might need a root canal?

Me: Yes, but I’m hoping you’ll tell me I don’t.

Dr. Yeltsin: You do.

He answered my questions: he only works one chair at a time, so when he was working on me, I would be his only patient. I could call for a brief time out any time I felt I had to. Given no complications, it would take no more than thirty minutes. All good.

Before I got to his office, I was a basket case of nerves. I truly thought Jordan would have to shovel me into the car. But it’s like they say with anxiety patients—you can be a trembling mass of jelly inside, but on the outside, you are calm and collected. The whole thing got me to thinking, again, about my anxiety. It’s not that I’m afraid of pain—through an extreme hip condition, a torn rotator cuff, chronic kidney disease, and who knows what else, I have demonstrated a tolerance for pain and discomfort that has led my kids to scold me. But what I am afraid of is fear.

I am afraid of being afraid.

If I could walk into the dentist’s office without a qualm, I’d be great. But I can’t. Instead I feel a strange disconnection from reality, almost as though I will faint. Sometimes my stomach rebels, as it did today, and I fear embarrassing but urgent need for the bathroom. It’s a whole set of physical symptoms I cannot control.

Tonight there was a thread on a writers’ listserv that I follow about not being able to write during trauma. Authors wrote about their inability to write while a close relative was dying or some other great trauma was upsetting their lives. Knock on wood I’ve not had that kind of great trauma, except perhaps divorce which left me alone with four children, or, of course, the death of my parents. But I have instead found writing a refuge in troubled times.

Writing fiction allows me to escape into the world of my characters, away from the world that is troubling me. For instance, Kelly of the Kelly O’Connell Mystery Series has a husband she loves, two daughters she adores, a close circle of friends, and a good career as a real estate broker and renovation expert. Would that my life was so perfect. But even when Kelly must deal with death and deceit, I find her world comforting. I like the people. I am comfortable with them. They have an insular world without root canals and heart monitors and a lot of daily “stuff” that bothers me.

Granted, that’s sort of a superficial view. Today’s world has so much trauma—pandemic, Ukraine, an appalling divisiveness that has taken hold of our country. It’s maybe trivial to say I can escape into my fictional worlds, but the truth is when I wake at three in the morning worrying about Ukraine President Zelensky and the assassination attempts he has survived, I go to Irene’s culinary world in Chicago. That diva can be really distracting.

Is that ignoring the seriousness of our world? I don’t think so. I speak out often and clearly about my political and moral beliefs. But at three in the morning, I also look out for myself.