I inherited bad teeth from my mom. To make matters worse, I was a lazy bastard growing up, and I rarely brushed them. Also, I drank about a gallon of Coke a day. Combined, those three things are a dental death sentence.
When I was 10, my dentist told me that if I kept up my habits, I’d have dentures by the time I was 21. He was uncannily accurate. I ended up getting the last of my remaining teeth yanked, and a shiny new set of dentures just six months after my 21st birthday. The dentist tried to talk me into getting a full set of dental implants that are anchored to the jaw with titanium rods, but that procedure is somewhere on the order of $10,000 - just a tad out of my price range. 
The dentist went on and on about how uncomfortable and inconvenient the dentures would be. He told me that I’d have trouble eating very hard foods because I simply couldn’t exert enough pressure to bite through them. He even told me that people who live most of their lives with dentures tend to have more digestive problems and die younger because of poorly-chewed food.
Despite all his warnings, I’d have to say that I’m very happy with my dentures. For $1500, I got a set of dentures custom-molded to fit my mouth. I don’t look like a circus freak or an old man. Nobody knows my teeth aren’t real unless I tell them. The only things I can’t eat are food products that are excessively sticky - saltwater taffy, bubble gum, and things of that nature. There are, however, many kinds of chewing gum that I can enjoy without sticking. I have no problems chewing things like tough steaks. I can bite right into hard candies.
One thing I always worried about was dropping and breaking my dentures in half. I’m a clumsy oaf, so I knew it would happen sooner or later. When it finally did happen, I freaked out. How was I going to eat? Where was I going to get the money to get them fixed? Could they be fixed? How long would I be without teeth?
Every one of my fears was quickly put to rest. My dentist sent me to a lab across town. I dropped off my broken dentures and came back a couple of hours later to find them good as new. Total cost? A mere $35!
In some ways, I like my dentures more than real teeth. Ever get little pieces of food stuck in your teeth and spend several minutes with a toothpick or your fingernail trying to dislodge them? Not me. I just yank them out and turn the kitchen sink sprayer on them.
I don’t have to deal with brushing and flossing the “hard to reach places” the tootbrush commercials are always harping about. I just pull my teeth out and remove every last speck of dirt with my hard-bristled brush in mere seconds.
I even leave them in my mouth when I sleep. It’s not uncomfortable at all. According to the dentist, though, I should sleep without them at least one night a week for some gum-health-related reason that I can’t remember offhand.
I had originally planned to get the dental implants sometime down the road when I have money, but now I’m not so sure. The dentures have worked out so great for me that I can’t think of any compelling reason to switch.
The dentist wife jokes around that I should have Xmas dinner at their house!