I had a filling put in one of my top right molars earlier this month and then just this weekend, I had another filling placed in one of top left molars. It’s not a pleasant thing to have two fillings done in a span of two weeks.
Before this latest procedure started, the dentist asked me a great question. She wanted to know if I often got food stuck in the area where she was about to work in. I excitedly said yes. The top left part of my teeth is a trap for food, especially meat. Whatever had gone on in that area, resulted in a large gap that allowed food to get into a space between two teeth but made it very difficult for the food to get out without flossing. I would sometimes come home from a dinner and immediately go floss out the area. I was often shocked at the amount of meat I was able to floss out of that space, just huge chunks of meat stuck right up in then. It was all very unfortunate.
So back to the dentist asking me about my food storage area between my teeth. She said that because she was putting in a filling in that area, she had the opportunity to reshape one of the teeth and close off that gap, preventing food from getting stuck up in there. She warned me it might not be perfect but it could be better than before.
The whole procedure went smoothly and quickly but I couldn’t tell if this filling had significantly changed the way I could eat going forward. I had to wait several hours for the freezing to wear off and then I had to go to dinner with my family for Lunar New Year. At dinner, I ate all sorts of delicious meats, some with a stringy texture that easily would have been stuck in my old teeth configuration. After dinner, I realized nothing had gotten stuck up there. It was such a relief to not have to pick at my teeth, trying to pluck half a steak from that gap.
This new filling was a minor life-changer!