This World Is Not My Home

A rare, serious blog post...

This week in the dental office I was scheduled to do some fillings on a pleasant young lady who I had previously seen for a cleaning.  At her cleaning, she had mentioned that she sometimes had pain in her jaw joint (TMJ) and we had discussed several common causes of jaw pain and treatments for them. 

When she returned for her filling appointment, I began as usual by numbing her mouth and placing a little rubber piece (mouth prop) in her mouth to help her stay open and give her teeth something to rest on.  When I placed the mouth prop she gasped and grabbed her jaw joint in pain.  Quickly, I took the mouth prop out of her mouth and asked her what happened.  She told me that her jaw joint really hurt with the mouth prop in, and then she asked, "Can I speak to you privately?"

I asked the assistant to leave the room and close the door.

Once we were alone, she started to cry as she told me, "I was punched in the face about a month ago.  Do you think that could have caused my jaw pain?"

Big tears continued to fall as (I imagine) she re-lived the moment of abuse in her mind.  I had tears in my eyes as I asked, "Are you safe now?"

She nodded that she was in a safe place now and so we talked for a while about trauma to the TMJ and how we could go about diagnosing if any permanent damage had ben done.  She obviously didn't want to talk about the abuse anymore, but I pressed her one more time to talk as I asked her if she needed help, and reminded her that there were lots of resources available if she needed them.  I told her I would be happy to help in any way I could.  She cried one last tear and brushed it away as she waved off my attempts to help her, saying, "It's fine now.  I'm ok."

I didn't know I would have conversations like these in my dental office, but I should have.  Abuse and neglect lurk everywhere, only surfacing when someone has the courage to speak. 

This week I am reminded:  This world is not my home, I'm just passing through/My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue/The angels beckon me from Heaven's open door/And I can't feel at home in this world anymore.

Better things to come...