The Dentist and Dental Technicians

     Going to  my dentist--my dentists over the years--and seeing my dental technicians spotlights the matters of "side effects" and "physical capabilities."
     For many years, I took an anticonvulsant to control my seizures--an anticonvulsant whose side effect was inflamed gums, among others.  As a child, I was not aware of other anticonvulsants that existed to control seizures.  I don't know whether that was a function of my age, or of the anticonvulsants that were available for doctors to prescribe.  It well may be that it was a function of both.  Whatever the availability of anticonvulsants in the 1960s, and 1970s, the effect was the same.  I knew I had seizures.  My seizures needed to be controlled by anticonvulsants.
     That said, each time I went to my routine dental appointment, I understood that I was going to determine whether or not I had any cavities.  Time and again, my dentist would look in my mouth and say, "Your gums are inflamed."
     "I take an anticonvulsant that is known to inflame gums."
     "Well, try harder when you brush your teeth.  Floss your teeth.  That will really help to reduce the inflammation," the dentist would say.
     Time and again, I felt guilty.  I was frustrated.  I felt angry.
     "Listen.  I cannot hold, much less manipulate the floss.  My right hand is affected by my cerebral palsy.  Due to the nature of my cerebral palsy, my right arm is inordinately stiff.  I don't think about it that much, because I have never known my right hand to be any other way.  But, for purposes here, purposes of self-disclosure, it is an important point to include.
 \   "I cannot position my hand, and hold it steady to move the floss between my teeth.  I cannot floss.  Don't tell me to floss.  It isn't going to happen.  I did not know until later in my life to say that I did not have "fine motor skills"  in my right hand."
     I am not sure whether I had said that as a kid, the dentist would have understood what I was saying.  I did not know how to convey that if I could grasp onto the floss that I could not guarantee that I could hold onto the floss.
     The saying, "the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing," is true for me.  Until recent years, I have not been able to grasp onto much larger objects with my right hand, and hold onto them.  For many years, I would need to guide my right hand into a given position with my left hand, before my left hand could go back to performing its role in a given task.  Even if I was successful in strong arming my right hand, I could not guarantee that my right hand would continue to hold up her end of the bargain.
     The scenario with the flossing, has continued beyond one dentist.  I confess that I have not been a model patient.  I do not know what might have been different had my guilt, anger, and frustration clouded my efforts.
     Self-advocacy and public education have been essential throughout my life.  To this day, I need to be at the ready to advocate for myself, and provide on-the-spot public education.  Self-advocacy is a matter of dispelling preconceptions, myths, and biases.  Accomplishing these three goals is achieving a "healthy, intelligent medical partnership."