the dentist

i had put it off as long as i could...it had to happen. and it was every bit has hellacious as i thought it would be if not worse. not just in terms of the lingering pain in my jaw and the fact that i had to suck scrambled eggs off my plate last nite since i couldn't open my mouth, but also because as a person living with environmental illness I'll be sick/recovering for days to come. the dentists office is probably one the more toxic places i ever venture into...that and hospitals, which i avoid like the plague unless my life is in danger. actually, most offices or public buildings are pretty bad. often those of us with e.i. get referred to as "canaries in the coal mine"...and i'll tell ya this little bird drops like a brick after a dentist appt.
only thing keeps me from running in terror when first confronted with the smell of the office is the fact that i need my teeth.

and then ofcourse there are all the lovely chemicals they fill my mouth/body with...i love that epoxy type taste that trickles down my throat while i've got a zillion different implements in my helpless mouth.

i was there for hours.

i don't remember driving home....times like this is when i really wish new mexico had a better personal assistant program for rural people with disabilities. I shouldn't have been driving.
then when i returned back home to my one woman farm some adrenaline induced survival mechanism kicks in and i'm scurrying around chopping wood,starting the fire, feeding animals and putting water on for a bath so i can get all the smells off of me. its like i'm on speed, my ribs are shaking...racing with the novacains life expectancy since i know that once the pain sets in i'm going to fall apart and stay apart for quite sometime.

Sometimes when i'm sick from exposures, and weepy and weak, i like to call my dogs to me and just love them love them feel their fur and muscley ribs bury my face in their coats and inhale the smell of mountains and dirt and earthy animal.

small things ground me, the sheep running to me from the high pasture, the lives of animals....