Dental Adventures - Day Twelve, Friday

The day after her molar unceremoniously shot across an exam room, SweetPea and I ventured back to our regular dental office for her cleaning, which would be followed the next week by getting her crown and tada! The end!

If only.

Apparently sometime in the 11 days between her first appointment, which was when this one was scheduled, and the day of her appointment, the hygienist stopped working Fridays.

Which totally would have been awesome to know before, you know, showing up for the appointment SweetPea was scheduled for with her.

The office manager said that they had tried to call. The change in phone numbers that SweetPea noted during the last appointment apparently did not so much "take".

The office manager also said that they had tried to contact us by email and proceeded to correctly read back my email address. Strangely, even though my email comes directly to my cell phone, I never did receive any communication from their office regarding this appointment at all.

What pissed me off more than not being contacted regarding a cancelled appointment was the office manager's attitude that, surely, we had not scheduled an appointment for this day. Until I presented her with the appointment card that said otherwise.

And then and then she had the cajones to say "I'm just trying to help you."

Really?

Because helping me would include honoring the appointment your staff scheduled 11 days ago.

Helping me would include not trying to make it out like I'm at fault for the incompetence of your staff.

She managed to do some wrangling and got SweetPea in that afternoon to see the doctor for a temporary crown and to take measurements for the permanent crown. An appointment was made for the next week for the cleaning and the permanent crown.

It was that afternoon that we, finally, found out about the astronomical copay we were on the hook for to get the crown.

Seriously?

Could we have not made this discovery on Day One, since you knew she was going to need a crown then?

I guess that would be too easy.

While we were going through the process of getting the temporary crown, and taking measurements, the rest of the staff was so friendly and jovial that I started to think that the near catfight with the office manager must have been some fluke or a figment of my imagination.

Until she went walking by the exam area, glanced up, made eye contact with me, jumped and then skittered away just as fast as she could. She spent the rest of the time we were there holed up in her office.

SweetPea did go back on Day Eighteen to get her permanent crown and her cleaning. Because she had to get a deep root cleaning, and they can only do half at a time, she still has to go back for a cleaning on the other half of her mouth.

Eighteen days.

The dentist told her it will be about five more weeks before the hole where her molar used to be closes, and about six months to a year before the bone grows back, if it will at all.

Thank goodness this adventure is largely over. I hope we don't have to repeat anything like this.

As for me, I'm pretty sure I need a new dentist.

I can just imagine the nasty notes that are in my file right now.

Hee hee.