Hello. My name is Myfanwy Collins and I am an aggressive brusher.
Yes, that’s right, today I have a dentist appointment. A routine cleaning, at which the hygenist will chastise me for being an aggressive brusher. I like to brush frequenly–five or six times a day if I had my druthers, but now that I have been labelled “aggressive” I am only allowed to brush twice a day. I find it extremely unsatisfying.
Like most people, I am not fond of dentist visits. And, to be quite honest, many of the dentists I’ve gone to in the past have not done much to enhance my already wary view of them. Take my first dentist, for example. At age four, he set me down a path of distrust and frustration. Here is what happened:
My next door neighbor and friend, Peter, (hey Peter, if you’re reading this! Remember me? How’s your big sister? Hey, do you remember the time she pulled down your pants in the driveway and licked your penis in front of a group of kids and said it tasted “salty”? My sisters and I still talk about that. And remember how your little sister was always “falling down the stairs” and ending up with bruises all over? And remember that birthday cake your mother made with all of the small, choking hazzard toys baked inside of it? Gee, I miss living next door to your fucked up family because it made my own seem so normal) and I were playing in his backyard. I found a metal pipe and held it up to my mouth and pretended it was a horn out of which I was saying, “toot, toot.” And good ole Peter thought it would be fun if he took the croquet mallet he was holding and smashed into the pipe, knocking it into my two front baby teeth. Ouchie.
Anyway, when my mother brought me to the dentist and explained the situation, he examined my by then blackened teeth and said, “Too much candy.”
I felt completely betrayed.
Since then I have been treated by many dentists, including a dentist who performed the most time consuming root canal in history (I think it was over six or seven weeks, once a week and in the end I lost the tooth anyway). He was an interesting fellow. I’ll never forget the time he was passing a kidney stone, and told me so, during one of our sessions. Ah yes! I felt in such good, shaky and sweating hands!
And here I am today, eagerly awaiting what’s in store. Today is the day I meet my new dentist and learn what a fuck up I am for brushing too aggressively and not flossing enough. Can’t wait!
myfanwy collins 