Back from a hiatus of sorts…
So, I’ve been gone for quite a while, 5 months to be exact - but for good reason! 2 main ones to be exact.
My first lame excuse is that I have been busy with my new job, which I love, and getting ready to go back to school (yay for grad school!). Honestly, I have loved every minute of it all but it’s kept me quite busy.
My second (and more calculated) reason is that I needed to step back from my neuroticism. You may have noticed (and if you didn’t you may want to work on your attention to social cues) that I can be a bit, well, over dramatic. It’s true. But my dramatics were making me crazy, literally! Blogging about was just helping to reinforce a lot of negative thoughts. During my non-blogging times I have attempted to do a number of things, most of which I have been succeeding at.
One of the main things I wanted to do was to stop freaking out about going to the dentist. Things have definitely gotten better - I don’t spontaneously cry in the chair any more and I have stopped having nervous breakdowns the 24 hour period before my appointment. All good things. This doesn’t mean there haven’t been relapses, as with any addictions the relapses tend to be doozies. Case in point: Calmly waiting for the dentist - she is late….by an hour (!!!!) and I have to listen to some crazy women on her cell phone describe in painful detail her gum scraping and bleeding issues. Honestly, you would have been horrified too, however may not have started to cry and plead with her to stop speaking causing you to be the un-welcome center of attention in the waiting room. I got seen almost immediately after that.
My other resolution was to stop worrying so much! This includes (but is not limited to) not speaking about or bringing up my braces at every available oppurtunity, not staring in the mirror and deciding I am a monster, not touching them all the time with my tongue (not only does this one cause bleeding but also unnecessary sexual advances…) and when they come up simply acknowledgeing them and then moving on. By not bringing them up and thinking about them all the time it really has made it better all around. (If I hear one “I told you so” so help me….)
Now that you are up to date - I have a couple of anecdotes to share:
- While eating a salad, trying to be good about eating healthy, I inadvertently broke a bracket while eating a crouton. The combination of a crunchy crouton and bracket snapping off my tooth made the most horrendous noise inside my mouth. I thought I was dying. The situation then progressed as such: I froze in utter terror (thinking if I moved all my teeth would just fall out). Then I cried. A lot. Like, hyperventilating, sobbing. Then I made it to the bathroom where I stopped crying until I saw the bracket hanging there and little blood soaked lettuce pieces in my mouth (sorry for the graphicness…). I cried more. Almost fainted. Called my friend. Hung up on my friend. Called the hospital and had them page the on call doctor (yea….overboard much?). Then I lay supine on my floor crying not knowing quite what to do since it was Saturday of Thanksgiving
weekend. The email I received back from my doctor the next day was, and this is a direct quote, “Those crazy croutons will always get you! Come in Thursday. Use wax.” Needless to say, it was fixed relatively easily and upon reflection I realize that I not only overreacted I was preposterously irrational. Lesson Learned: If you break a bracket it doesn’t actually hurt (just scary noises) and is fixed easily. No need to call 911 or lay supine on the floor like a 13 year old emo kid. - Both of the ortho assistants got their braces off. I now hate them too - we are no longer allies.
- Still on my healthy eating kick I brought celery sticks and carrot sticks as snacks. Only to realize I couldn’t eat them. Physically unable to eat them. They mocked me with their healthy crunchiness. I have since switched to mangoes, pineapples and other fancy fruit to spite them and their rigidity.
- My lovely ortho decided that everything is moving along swimmingly and just as I was finally getting used to everything in there she decided to put springs in my mouth. Yup, Springs. It felt like a tension rod was in my mouth keeping my mouth propped awkwardly opened (ok, only for like a day but still!). That night however me and a friend got margaritas and all was semi ok (or at least numb).
And lastly, I was told that my bottom braces will be going on soon. Great. When exactly? The third Thursday in April. For those unaware (I am assuming, like, all of you) that is my birthday. Happy Birthday - More Orthodontics! I told her “No, I am eating cake without bleeding on my birthday”. I will see you the first week in May. She agreed - I think just so I wouldn’t cry. Mental note: I need to get her a really nice gift when this process is all over - perhaps something shiny and pointy to shove into her face (OK, sorry, not nice.). Maybe a basket full of caramels and crunchy veggies and sandwiches on focaccia bread or whatever. I’ll keep brainstorming.
So there you have it, we are all updated. Hopefully I will continue to update frequently.
P.S. I thought that braces would be the end of any dating/social interaction with the opposite sex but I have been proven wrong! Lots of dates soon after I got them on and as of recently a steady dating boy. Yes, very exciting indeed - and it hasn’t seemed to be an issue (i mean other than my own).
