“The strongest oak of the forest is not the one that is protected from the storm and hidden from the sun.It’s the one that stands in the open where it is compelled to struggle for its existence against the winds and rains and the scorching sun.” – Napoleon Hill
Hello, Reader and Writer Friends! I hope this post finds you well and blessed with the energy, time, and resources you need and deserve. I am grateful to you and wish you joy. The past few weeks have brought both expected and unexpected news, tasks, challenges, joys, and sorrows to my little corner of the planet, and I suspect they may have to yours also.
Changes of season, the holidays, national and world events, community and family celebrations, work, play, plans, and the shadow of illness and even death for some have been on the hearts and minds of many.
This week in my little town we’ve lost a young woman to suicide. The tragic and violent event has left many of us in shock, and the pain is palpable. And yet, standing right beside that horror, we also have grace in the shape of a group of dear people who planned and cooked and decorated our community center, and fed everyone in town who wished to come. And we had the Christmas tree lighting in the park, followed by fireworks. And we have a live nativity on Main Street coming in a few days. And I’m going to Disneyland with my grandkids next week. And yet, a friend’s cat died and one of our own adopted cats disappeared (you see how the sadness creeps back in). And yet, I got a surprisingly good medical report from my doctor. And in the netherworld of being a writer, I began another round of manuscript submissions today, sending out queries to six publishers.
The light shifts, the wind blows.
We manage as best we can, remembering that the strongest oak
This is not my kitty. It’s a sweet expression though, and I love kitties.
I woke up this morning acutely aware of several things. None of them were good, considering the state of current affairs, but, for me, the first breath of consciousness each day brings the unwelcome reminder that I no longer have any teeth (on the top of my jaw anyway. This may or may not be called the “crown” of my gums . . . I have asked Mr. Googly, but I’m still not sure). Also, I only have 13 teeth left on the bottom, which, hey, I’m grateful for so that’s why I state it only as an aside and not as part of my general complaint. Anyway, this is what waking up means to me.
I am aware that this is not an appealing topic.
Well, some people love me. But sometimes I get sad anyway.
I am an American woman with ill-fitting dentures that I take out at night. Most nights. Some nights I just leave them in.
But you aren’t supposed to leave them in. Why? Something about giving your gums a rest and not letting bacteria build up. According to The American College of Prosthodontists (ACP), the association that represents the specialty of prosthodontics: “Yes, you can wear your dentures at night, but it is preferred that they be removed. You should remove your dentures at night, and this will give your gums and bone a chance to relax from the pressure of the denture during the day. If you need to wear your dentures for social reasons or to prevent your jaws from over closing, you should find time during the day to properly clean your mouth and your prostheses. You should never wear your dentures 24 hours a day without performing proper oral hygiene. Dentures should be cleaned at night and stored in water during the night.”
So, that’s a no, yes? My guy in Fallon said to take them out . . . (he never mentioned unless I needed to keep them in for “social reasons” or to avoid over-closing jaws) . . . more on that later.
So, I usually take them out. Then—I wake up in the morning feeling like my face is a sad stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway after a torrential downpour. Part of me is washed away.
That’s me on the left. All smiles. Brand new teeth.
By now, some readers might be thinking (in addition to oh dear lord please stop), what about implants?
When I inquired about the cost of implants, I was given the “ballpark” figure of $40,000. “It’s like buying a car,” my Fallon guy said. Indeed. And I would be the first person to say that I’d much rather have a complete set of permanent teeth than a new car. Absolutely! But that’s false equivalency; it isn’t a choice between teeth and a car. Not at all. There’s no money for either of those things. I was lucky to be able to scrape the money together for the dentures, which came to something closer to $4,000 (including the cost of the extraction of my “unsavable” natural teeth). I drive a car that I bought used 10 years ago for much less than $40,000 and have managed to pay off. So I’m not in the market for a new car, and implants were never going to happen.
This breaks my heart, and it also angers me. Why is dental care so difficult to attain? Is it because of a general American lack of concern for healthcare for its citizens overall? Is it because I am lazy and do not deserve teeth? I mean, I have a job. I’ve always had jobs, but some of them (at peak important dental crisis periods), didn’t include dental insurance. If I had been born into a wealthy family, or perhaps if I had been born in a different country, would I still have my teeth? I don’t know. Certainly, lifelong, consistent dental care could have saved me some of my dental losses. I remember having a tooth pulled when I was in my twenties that could have been saved if I’d had the money for a root canal and a crown.
I’d like to hear about the experiences of people from other places. Is this something that happens to many of my peers, but I just don’t know about it because it is humiliating, and no one dares speak of it? And what about people who lose their teeth to accidents or illness? What recourse do they have?
More big smiles. Happier days.
I know there are people suffering much more in places that are much worse. I know that many people of my parents’ generation wore dentures for much of their adult lives, and I don’t remember hearing much grumbling about it, perhaps another reason that their designation as The Greatest Generation is so apt. My parents survived The Great Depression, they fought in World War II (Dad was a Marine in the Pacific) or supplied the troops (Mom worked in an airplane factory), they ballroom danced like athletes, swinging with The Big Bands, and they never complained. Perhaps part of the saying about keeping a stiff upper lip comes from their ability to hide their discomfort about dentures? I don’t know, but I admire them for it.
Does that mean I should just embrace my toothlessness? I mean, my parents weren’t crying about it. And if I should embrace my loss, how, exactly, do I do that?
I miss my teeth. I miss my smile. Like Elf, I love to smile. Smiling is my favorite.
Also, I can’t eat numerous foods that I love. This includes crispy raw vegetables and taco shells and chewy candy—the obvious things—but also many others like pizza or sandwiches or good crusty bread. Believe me, dentures do not allow it.
Again, I could be wrong. According to The American College of Prosthodontists, “Most patients need to learn how to use dentures properly and as a result, it takes a little time to get used to them. After a while, you should be able to eat fairly normally, but it may take more time to get comfortable with harder foods or sticky foods. Using a small amount of denture adhesive (no more than three or four pea-sized dabs on each denture) may help stabilize the dentures and help hold them in place while you learn how to get comfortable with them and may make the learning process easier.”
“Fairly” is one of the key words in that paragraph. Fairly normally seems to include scrambled eggs, overcooked vegetables, soup, cooked cereals such as cream of wheat, mashed potatoes (a high point), and pudding. Oh! and thank goodness, ice cream is still an option.
Perhaps I struggle with eating because my dentures are particularly ill-fitting compared to others. This I don’t know. What I do know is that they fall out, they move around, and they whistle occasionally (something I could never accomplish before, that, no, I am not grateful for).
I also know that the denture adhesives help a bit, but the downside of using them includes the overflow stickiness that can make it impossible to move parts of my lips at times. True, I use more than the American College of Prosthodontists’ advised “three or four pea-sized dabs.” That’s because three or four pea-sized dabs do absolutely nothing!
Also, said stickiness, which isn’t sticky enough to stop the dentures from moving around during everyday activities like talking and eating, is somehow too sticky to allow its removal at the end of the day. The only way to get most of the adhesive off I’ve found is to scrape my gums and the roof of my mouth vigorously with one dry paper towel after another until I am sore and gagging and my husband has left the room.
I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention that many dental adhesives contain zinc, and though a certain amount of zinc is recommended, and is usually sourced from a regular diet, digesting extra zinc via the adhesive breaking down and being swallowed can mean that the denture wearer using adhesives with zinc may experience health issues. Excess “oral zinc can cause copper deficiency, and zinc contained in dental adhesives may thus cause hypocupraemia.” [Prasad R, Hawthorne B, Durai D, McDowell I. Zinc in denture adhesive: a rare cause of copper deficiency in a patient on home parenteral nutrition. BMJ Case Rep. 2015 Oct 9;2015:bcr2015211390. doi: 10.1136/bcr-2015-211390. PMID: 26452740; PMCID: PMC4600814]
The good news here is that I’ve just done a search and discovered there are many varieties of dental adhesive currently on the market that are zinc free. This was a welcome surprise! Examples include: Secure Waterproof Denture Adhesive – Zinc Free, Extra Strong 12 Hour Hold Super Poligrip, and Effergrip Zinc Free Denture and Partials Adhesive Cream Extra Strong Denture Adhesive Cream, Zinc Free.
This bit of happy news, you might hope, will conclude my treatise on the sorrows and lessons of dentures, but I would be remiss if I did not mention . . ..
Intimacy in the bedroom at night on the rare occasion my spouse and I are both awake past eight o’clock. I think this must be one of the unmentionable “social reasons” cited by the American College of Prosthodontists. Alas, my post-natural-teeth desirability rating has fallen. I was never a supermodel, but I was the woman who never went without mascara or lipstick, who shaved her legs every day, and did everything possible within my budget to remain healthy and attractive.
Perhaps I’m being punished for my “vanity.”
I lost my teeth because I tried too hard?
I don’t think so. Mostly because it was never vanity to begin with. It was insecurity. Or, it was being a woman and knowing how women were judged. It may have been many things, but whatever sad mid-century thing it was, it was certainly never vanity.
But, hey. I’ve been up for hours now. I’ve put myself back together. Therefore, the only things I have left to worry about for the rest of today are: The state of current affairs. My missed visit to my family. Medical bills. Owing the IRS. More stray kittens needing to go to the veterinarian. The car that suddenly broke down.
Never mind.
I’m going to make a nice dinner and have a glass of wine. Some nice, homemade, soft and easy-to-chew food. Maybe soup? And a chilled Chardonnay. Definitely, a chilled Chardonnay.
After all, what do I have to worry about? What do any of us?
“We grow, regress, get stuck, fragment, hide, and find ourselves over and over again.” – Audrey Stephenson, Psychotherapist.
Learn!
Dear Ones,
Today’s readings and my own writing are themselves fragments struggling to find growth. I began by looking at my query status on Query Tracker. Added another rejection to the list. Okay. Next I wrote a short chapter in a new manuscript, one that I do not love in the way that I love the finished one I haven’t found an agent for. It’s hard to fall in love with a new manuscript sometimes. For me, anyway. I am sentimental, perhaps.
To escape, I ventured outside to the laundry room, which is separated from the main house by only a few feet, thinking I would do some productive laundry readying for my work week which begins tomorrow, Tuesday, which is quite wonderful right?–not on Monday, dreaded Monday–but on Tuesday, which I have to be grateful for. And I am. So, a little laundry, and then back to writing, I thought. Until I spotted the giant bug on the laundry room door. Yes, the Mormon crickets are still upon us here. Clearly a sign not to do the laundry.
Then I wrote in long hand–natural left-handed cursive usually brings me back to myself. Maybe even always when I spend enough time there. Today’s topic in my guided journal was Soul Searching: The quest to unlock one’s true self is an ongoing process, because we’re changing all the time (Breathe Journal, c2023. Guild of Master craftsman Publiscations Ltd. http://www.breathemagazine.co.uk. 72-3). Here are two of the prompts given in the journal and my responses:
*Observe every aspect of your surroundings–from the bed you sleep in, to the transport you use. Things around you can shine a light on how you interact with your environment and indicate what you believe about yourself. What do you notice?
Sue’s pillow
Me: My bed must be clean and bright, soft and matchy-matchy- and made! Looking around me: Polished wood. Sunlight. Windows. Plants. Crystal. Books. Lois’s quilt. Photos. Art. Candles. Sue’s pillow. Baskets. Listening to music…
Lois’s quilt
(After I finished, I noticed I didn’t observe “the transport” I use. I could take a picture of my feet, which is what I try to use the most, but we don’t have a mani-pedi salon in Austin. Then I thought of my dear Jeep, Joni Blue. She’s not new, but she’s paid for, and she’s taken us to many beautiful places. She’s currently outside with the crickets, so I will not be going outside to take her picture.)
2. *Breathe. You will be astonished by how often you hold your breath. Just notice. Drop your shoulders, stretch your neck, allow your abdomen to soften. Breathe. Notice what comes up as you come back to yourself and jot down any thoughts.
Me: This is one of the best gifts I learned way back in Lamaze childbirth class and years later in yoga–the magic loosening and lightening of the body and mind through the breath. Surpisingly, I still forget to practice it, often until I am panicked. I need reminders.
Time to breathe
For today, perhaps this enough. Two hours of dedicated writing, reading, journaling, and blogging. If it doesn’t feel good enough, perhaps it’s because “we grow, regress, get stuck, fragment, hide, and find ourselves over and over again,” and that’s all part of the progress.
Wishing you growth and rest, a room of your own, and the company of good souls. I’d love to hear what you’re working on, or not working on, or dreaming about. Thank you for reading, following, and commenting on my blog. Fondly, Lori
Being vegetarian and eating greens and salads out is always a risk, it s hard to be 100% sure all you eat is absolutely safe, so take it twice a year to guarantee your body is free from unwanted organism
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