Eva in Wonderland

The week I turned 40 I lost a tooth and wrecked my car, in two separate unrelated scenarios. When you are six or seven losing a tooth is adorable, at 4o the same look is trailer park scary.I have been extremely defensive about losing this tooth. I do brush and I don't have any major periodontal disease. For the record the tooth had to come out because I go an infection in my gum over the only tooth in my whole head that did not have any root. I mean really, what are the odds? In place of the gaping hole my dentist put a fake tooth connected to a retainer. Yes a retainer just like I had in seventh grade. The fake tooth/retainer thing is a total pain in the ass. It falls out if I laugh too hard(literally it has flown out of my mouth, really embarrassing), eating has become a complicated and tasteless activity and there is no gum chewing. I really love gum. The fake tooth thing has a cute name, they call it a "flipper", making one think of happy aquatic animals. It is NOT cute. It is supposed to be temporary even though it costs $250. It is also extremely wimpy. Since June I have broken three of these flippers. Permanent replacement of teeth, it turns out, is obscenely expensive. Dental insurances do not think that tooth replacement is a necessity. If they could see my husband laughing at my gap toothed grimace (I certainly don't smile ) perhaps they would then see the necessity for a replacement.
This whole experience has been demeaning and anxiety provoking. In the past my face has blown up to the size of a prize winning county fair pumpkin(thanks to steroids),and I have huge unsightly scars due to a knee replacement (look forward to that story in a future blog!), I have had bouts of bright red rashes all over my body but the missing tooth has been the most confidence crushing of all of these looks.
The first time the fake tooth broke I hid in my house for a whole week until the new one came in. That weekend the replacement broke. They sent it back to the lab to try to repair it. It broke again and is now down to the tooth and a tiny piece of plastic, the whole thing is no bigger than the size of a chicklet. I tried to repair it with my son's airplane glue, which I am pretty sure is toxic but still better than going out toothless. I am afraid that I might swallow it but wear it nevertheless. It has now come down to me holding the crappy fake tooth up with my tongue and only wearing it for "special occasions". This is so wrong and almost feels conspiracy-ish. I resent this whole dental nightmare. This only magnifies the obvious that started with me turning 40 and that is I am getting old !