Can you remember when the first time you went to the dentist was?
My earliest memory of being at the dentist was when I had my first tooth extraction. It was a new experience (and unknown things are scary, right?) that I don’t know where to place the feeling yet. Things also happened so fast that it felt like a dream. At one moment, I still have that good but misplaced tooth, and in another, just a bleeding space it used to sit on, now empty.
Almost two decades after, I had another extraction–the dentist had to remove two of my good teeth to treat the overcrowding. And what choice do I have if I want to have my condition fixed, right?
Of course, I went through with it. And the memory of two decades earlier just came rushing back, which reminded me of my mother. Thank God for loving mothers!
When I was a kid, right after the tooth extraction, she bought me ice cream and told me it helps the gum to heal fast, on top of the medications. I never asked questions because I was simply too happy to have the ice cream. But two decades forward, alone and adulting, I was guided by that memory, and yes, you guessed it. I bought an ice cream too, but this time, only with the memory of my mother.
I realized that what we were exposed to as a child matters because we remember them growing up.
jessa 