Arrrgh, sob!

Today, the dentist narrowly avoided getting kicked in the cavity. Following decades of brutal treatment at the hands of old-style fangmen with old-style drills, in 1978 I joined the practice I am with now (having left briefly last year only to have the nerve jabbed and my tooth root pierced by a different dentist, so I went back).

For about 20 years I had a wonderful gentle, musical, philosophical Pole who never once caused me any pain. He retired and I was passed on to the head of the practice, a bluff, red-haired Scot who was a genius with the needle and drill and again, didn't ever hurt me. Tragically, he died aged only about 59.

Now I am with someone else and every time I go, I get hurt. Today was terrible. Three injections numbed my eye and my cheek, but not the tooth, so drilling out the old filling and cementing in the crown hurt so much that twice I cried out and once, my foot shot out and I nearly hit the ceiling. I was quivering in pain, tears in my eyes. And he had the cheek to tell me that there was nothing in my tooth that could have caused such pain. I'm sure he must have been close to the nerve.

Anyway, he wants to operate on the tooth he did the (very painful) root canal work on, and chop off the root that is still giving trouble. No way am I going to let him. Just imagine if the injection didn't work for that! Or if he decided to yank it out! I am now so phobic about him that I don't ever want to go back. But, as we all know, finding a new dentist is extremely difficult. And expensive. At present, my Denplan insurance costs £32 per month and my crown has just cost £125 on top of that. Going to a private dentist could cost hundreds every time - yet my Denplan costs nearly £400 a year. Don't know what to do. Pity about my current dentist. He's a very nice person, but hasn't got the magic touch!