Smile
Saturday, April 04, 2015
I dread visiting dentists. Once I start to open my mouth for their routine inspection, I am on the receiving end of tut-tuts, pity, annoyance, advice and a combination of some and all of these. Each and every time, I think to myself,
"Yes, I know my teeth are horribly crooked. Yes, I know I need braces. Yes, I know I need to do something about it."
I grew up with two working parents and four siblings in a modest household. We had everything we needed but not much for luxury, which I thought was fine on most days. Braces were out of the question - it would eat up too much of our family budget. Being the eldest daughter, I took this fact in stride and accepted that until I started earning my own money, my teeth would need to take a backseat.
As a child and teenager, I also accepted the fact that I could never be "beautiful." My notion of beauty at the time was perfection - perfect hair, perfect smile, perfect skin, perfect body. I had neither, as I had bushy hair, horrible teeth, pimply dark skin and a plump body. From then on, I worked hard on the one thing I considered my greatest asset - my brains. At the very least, I could achieve perfect grades when I wanted to. I graduated with the highest honours and landed a scholarship at my dream university.
I consider myself lucky that I got into relationships with partners who accepted all of me, including my imperfect smile. They appreciated my intelligence as much as my so-called beauty. I never experienced being forced to conform to alleged standards of beauty and perfection - they always let me be myself, including the good, the bad and the ugly.
Today, I am blessed with a husband who never once criticized my crooked smile. I have a husband who tells me he loves his beautiful and intelligent wife. Half the time, I greatly appreciate the part where he tells me he loves my brains. Half the time, I secretly wish I could accept the part about my beauty. It's still hard for me to fully accept; I still feel like an ugly duckling.
Last weekend, we paid a visit to a new dentist for teeth cleaning. My last appointment with a dentist was around three years ago. I made a fuss and got into a quarrel with my husband who did not want to be late for our appointment. He didn't know I was stalling and dreading that visit.
I braced myself for the tut-tuts, pity, annoyance, advice and a combination of some and all of these when she started to inspect my teeth. I waited. And waited. And waited. It never came. Instead, she commended me for good oral hygiene, given that she did not need to clean out my teeth so much. When I brought up the topic of braces, she first asked me if I thought there was a problem with my teeth.
That was the first time a dentist has ever posed that question to me.
"Do you have a problem with your teeth? Because I don't want the problem statement to come from me. It has to come from you. Who am I to state a problem which you don't consider a problem?"
Bluntly, I stated the obvious.
Again, for the first time ever, a dentist told me that while my teeth need work to be straightened out, she also told me that at the very least, my "profile" (i.e. the proportion from forehead to chin and from mouth to jawline) was fine. She advised that the only way to conclusively say braces could help me with my problem was to undergo an x-ray examination.
Needless to say, I walked out of that clinic feeling an extreme sense of relief and gratitude.
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