Third World Dentist

I'm not sure I've ever seen the same dentist twice. I just move that much.

Luckily, when I moved to Atlanta, I had someone here to recommend good doctors to me, but not a dentist. I had to find that one on my own.

So I searched through my insurance and picked one close to work and one that I could pronounce the name. I don't know, that just seemed important for some reason.

I went Wed. I haven't been in like a year and half. I take decent care of my teeth, but with new jobs, moving and such, a cleaning has just not made it up far enough on my list. With the possibility of losing my job soon, I'm getting in as many appointments as I can right now.

So I made the trip Wed to the dentist. On the way there, things looked a little familiar when I realized this was the area where my drunken escapade began. The office was a little white building amongst restaurants, bars and little shops. Strange...

I go in and I swear the place was the size of one of my old apartments. There were 3 assistants, the dentist and one other patient. In the back, there are 2 chairs. That's it.

I sit in the first seat, which happens to seem quite small. I look at the machine next to me and I swear to you this thing was from the 70's. The paint seemed to be peeling and there was green stuff around some of the metal and on the pipes. Knowing this wasn't good, I wasn't quite sure how to get out of the situation. So I stayed.

I would have thought that the lady down the street in the ghetto nail salon was cleaning my teeth. This woman was rough! She was going to town with that little dremmel-like tool. Stuff was all splattered on my face and she wouldn't bother to wipe it. She didn't use the little sucky thing to keep me from gaggin on my own saliva. It was just a mess. Afterward, she gave me small papercup of water to rinse and spit in the bowl.

I can't remember the last time I had to do that. But what was more scary was when I went to spit in the bowl and saw green crap on the little things that water comes out of. Ugh, I wonder if anyone has ever thrown up in that bowl.

After the 20 minute cleaning, they bring me to another chair so they can do x-rays. This 80 year old man, hunched over, walks up to me, introduces himself at the speed of a turtle and thanks me for choosing their office.

He took 2 x-rays. That's it. Usually on first visits, I'm used them taking 5 or 6. I'm not sure quite what they will find with 2, but okay.

He then proceeds to show me a laminated card from the 70's on how to avoid brushing aggressively. His words, "Your teeth look good and I think you are brushing them well, but I like to show everyone this." Huh???

He then shows me a little flyer from Crest on how to brush your teeth and he models it on a mold of some teeth. When he got to the part that said "in a circular motion" he says, "I don't know how you brush circularly, just brush 4-5 times in each are" as he continues to show me on the mold. He then tells me that they will call me if anything shows up on the x-rays and that he'll see me in March. The hell he will!

Now, I know I haven't been in almost 2 years, but I'm pretty damn sure that things are a little more advanced than that now.

I left the office cracking up. It was just that bad all I could do was laugh. I'm in Atlanta, come on now. I would maybe have expected this in a small town, but not in a city.

Needless to say, I will not be returning in March.