Monday, May 18, 2009

Another good thing about losing my job ... (a dental rant)


Wow, when you lose your regular source of income, you really find out who your true friends are ... and who's just into you for the money.

Today I found out my dentist of @10 years (name on request), falls into the LATTER category.

I had had my checkup and cleaning last week, and he'd told me I needed to have some expensive work on the veneers on my bottom front teeth.

The estimate he gave me showed that my part would be between $2,000 - $3,000 - that's over and above the part that my dental insurance would pay.

I told him I just couldn't commit to that, because (as I kept telling him, over and over, then and today), I'M LOSING MY JOB DAMMIT! and I can't take on any huge new debts! So he says, OK, we'll just do the one filling (last week he was saying I only actually needed one filling) and maybe you can do the rest later.

So this morning I show up at 9:45 a.m. for my 10 a.m. appointment, and finally get into the chair at 10:30, all psyched up to get the usual Novocaine and the scraping and the drilling and the filling (say that last part in a Bill Cosby voice, it sounds totally cool), only to be informed, first by him and then by his perky assistant, that they have to SHOW me, AGAIN, why they really need to do all that other stuff that I had already told them I couldn't afford to do!

Seriously, Dr. Mungcal, are you even paying attention to your patients anymore? I know you're all super successful and #1 Dentist of L.A. and all that great stuff, but you know what? It's patients like me, who came to see you when you first started, that put you there. Yet you can't even show a little tact and understanding towards me at this, a major turning point in my life?

Grr. Well, anyway, climbing down from the Rant Tree now. But I felt really angry about it. To the point where I allowed my feelings to come out.

Yes, that's right - I started to cry! In public, which I really hate. But you know what? Sometimes you just have to let people know that they're making you feel bad.

So with thinly disguised looks of disgust, the perky assistants allowed me to climb out of the chair and leave.

And leave I have ... for good! I've got a copy of their "recommended treatment plan" in my purse. NONE of the cavities he said I've got have caused me any pain or discomfort yet. So sometime in the near future, I'll make an appointment with my husband's dentist, show it to him, and if he agrees that all this work is really necessary ... well, we'll just have to work it out somehow.

See, I don't really mind the fact that he recommended this work. It's that even after I refused it, and explained why, he STILL kept trying to push me into it, with the ol' dental "guilt trip" about how if I don't get all this work done now, my teeth will all fall out and my gums will rot (or words to that effect).

And the really annoying thing is - yeah, he's probably got a point. This work probably should be done, if not now, then perhaps in the next few years. But it's the WAY he pushed it, trying to make me feel guilty for not spending money that I simply can't afford to spend right now, that upset me.

Deep sigh.

Well, at least now I know the awful tooth now - dentists simply have no fillings whatsoever!

P.S. Gained back the same 1.4 pounds I lost last week - oh well! Pretty soon I'll have plenty of time to work out!