That was the decade of the root canal and my first implant.īy the time I was in my forties, I could have paid for a midsized sedan with the amount I’d spent on dental work - not to mention X-rays, antibiotics, painkillers, and tubes of Fixodent. Like everything else about my eating disorder - the jutting ribs, the straw-like hair, the trips to the bathroom after every meal - my dying teeth were in plain sight for all to see. Pictures of me in my twenties show these half-moon teeth. Turns out if you throw up at least once - and more often two or three times - every day, coating your enamel with stomach acid, and also subsist mainly on Diet Coke, hard candy, and chewy Sprees, your teeth are going to fall out.įirst they’ll go translucent and soft, shortening into little nubs that you’ll try to hide. Years later we’re still waiting for universal medical and dental care. It was one of the worst infections the dentist had ever seen, requiring an extraction, antibiotics, and the promise of a bridge after he’d healed. Within an hour of coming in, the addicted man cried in relief as the Novocain took effect. I soon had scores of dental professionals who agreed to see patients, usually before or after office hours. I promised not to inundate them with clients or advertise their generosity. I asked for just one pro bono case per month. I described the emergencies I encountered when our doors opened in the morning, and the monthslong wait at our one free clinic. Months earlier I had written a letter to every dentist, oral surgeon, and endodontist in Sonoma County - a plea on behalf of our most desperate clients: the undocumented families who labored in our vineyards, the addicts in recovery, the homeless, the children of parents who worked minimum-wage jobs. Decay sets in: abscesses, lost teeth, or, as with this man, an infection that could easily have turned septic because of his poor health. When your life revolves around that next high, you crave sweets, neglect dental hygiene, and can’t afford dentists. Opiates were out of the question.Īddicts often have bad teeth. He was in terrible pain and looked exhausted. The Salvation Army recovery program sent him to me, an emergency-services social worker, hoping I could do something. There he is: that cute boy, right there beside his classmates, where he’s always belonged. I surprised myself by agreeing with her! I disclosed that I had long ago thrown away any school pictures and asked if she would make a copy of my photo and e-mail it to me. She pointed to my picture and commented on how cute I had been. A classmate I knew from sixth grade brought yearbooks for us to look through. In July 2012 my current wife, Nancy, and I attended my fiftieth high-school reunion. On the one hand, I felt attractive on the other, my life and my marriage were falling apart. Staring at my reflection, I began to cry. I couldn’t believe the mouth I saw in the mirror was mine. The strain took a toll on us both individually and as a couple. Five months into my job I was fired and went on unemployment and food stamps. Finding a job was difficult, but I landed one and then purchased a home. When the project we were working on ended in 1975, we returned to a U.S. The metal wires were then applied to the enamel, beginning the often-tortuous transformation. I found an orthodontist who recommended removing four teeth to ease the crowding. Having few expenses and good compensation, I decided to get braces. When I was thirty years old, my first wife, Elin, and I were working in São Paulo, Brazil. I became envious, imagining that with perfect teeth I’d be accepted. My blue-collar dad made enough to pay the bills with occasional splurges, but braces were out of the question. An already sensitive kid, I concluded that I was not very attractive.Īlthough a few of my classmates were fitted with braces, the same would not happen to me. My embarrassment deepened when kids at school called me Bucky Beaver, the mascot of a toothpaste brand in the 1950s. The excitement I felt at losing my baby teeth was soon replaced with horror when my new teeth emerged: the two in front were huge, and my lower teeth looked like cars on a highway after a severe winter storm.
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