When I was having a root canal done about 12 years ago, the dentist insisted that I get valium and take it before my final appointment.
Wow! Reading this thread reminds me why I had major dental work done before I gave up drinking. I use to have to schedule my appointments at 8:00 so I can arrive sober, get the work done, and then hit the nearest liquor store and go drink in the park (couldn’t wait to get home).
I’ve since given up drinking, and go to the dentist twice a year to make sure I don’t need any more work done.
I have a pretty good pain tolerance - walk around with broken ribs for a week before seeing a doc, that sort of thing - but for some reason I have little to no tolerance for dental pain. After a bitch told me “That can’t possibly hurt!” while blood was running down my chin I developed a certain aversion to the whole profession.
Fortunately, I encountered a dentist who listened to my history and concerns and helped me through enough cleanings to get my teeth and gums back in shape. Good experiences replaced bad. Then I moved to another state. The first dentist I saw apparently did a wallet biopsy and immediately started insisting on expensive, complex procedures and his explanations didn’t ring true to me. So I got a second opinion (which outraged Mr. Expensive when he heard about it) and Second Dentist called bullshit on Expensive Dentist, and also asked me about my past experiences, whether or not I had required sedation or pre-medication before… and that’s when Second Dentist became My Dentist, and he still is. He doesn’t insist on medication (he has some patients who have had extensive procedures done without needing or wanting anything at all) but is OK with it and always has it available. I’ve overhead him on a couple occasions when a patient indicated pain stop and make them comfortable again before proceeding. Which is as it should be. He is also very good about making sure my husband has antibiotics before procedures, as recommended for people with his medical conditions.
On his business cards he has “We cater to cowards”.
My teeth and gums are in good shape now - all I have needed for years are routine cleanings. Dentist visits are no longer painful.
It’s funny. I’m the opposite of Broomstick. I’m a wimp about most pain, but tolerate dental pain.
Spoilered for those who might cringe…
I just went in this past Thursday for gum grafts across most of my top front teeth. In going back over the shots I got, I counted at least a dozen - in the front , in the palate…And then I got to sit and watch while he basically sewed the new gums in. I thought it was pretty cool to see him pulling the thread up and out of my mouth.
The recover sucks, though. He had to cover up some thread at the top of my mouth. It was covered with something waxy feeling. It’s annoying - it’s like the feeling of having PB stuck to the top of your mouth - constantly. The gum grafts feel like that first feeling of getting braces. And the day after the surgery, I was hugely swollen. And almost a week of soups, yogurt, pudding, and cheese omelets is getting boring.
But that’s probably not the worst I’ve felt at the dentist:
I had a shot in the front of my mouth. I could feel the needle behind my nose.
Susan
I just came in to say that I would take nitrous for a haircut if the barber offered it. That is all.
Um, isn’t a local anaesthetic sedation? That’s to those people who’ve said they haven’t had any sedation, only a local.
To the OP: were you going to have a local anaesthetic as well?
I would have thought that taking a valium was unusual, even if you were going to have a local anaesthetic as well, but it’s not a problem as long as you tell the dentist - unless you’re going there once a week or more. It makes you calmer when you’re about to undergo something that you know is going to be painful, so why not do it if it works for you and your dentist is OK with it?
I don’t usually have any sedation (not even a local anaesthetic), but the pain only lasts for a few minutes anyway, when having a filling. For a root canal, I probably would want a local anaesthetic, but I’ve never had to have one. They sound too painful to have no pain killers at all, for most people.
No, a local anesthetic is not sedation. It doesn’t have any effect other than to numb the particular area in question and a person with a local is perfectly competent to do anything other than chewing and maybe talking clearly after the procedure.
“Everyone”??? Not by a long shot.
But it’s not that rare either! I need Halcion + nitrous to have anything major done due to very severe dental anxiety.
If you happen to benefit from the Valium, nothing wrong with that (assuming the usual precautions re driving etc. are observed).
Are you me?
:::sees central Pennsylvania address:::
:::checks own address:::
:::realizes I haven’t lived in central PA in a few decades:::
I semi-jokingly have suggested to several dentists that they just yank 'em all and let me get dentures. They all look horrified and refuse.
Heh. And yet, this was the dentist’s advice to my father 35 or 40 years ago when he was losing one tooth after another for various reasons. So that’s what they did. I’d give you the name of my father’s dentist from that time, but I suspect he’s retired or dead by now 
I’m probably an odd case here. As a little girl I was treated by a dentist who specialized in treating children but who didn’t actually seem to like kids at all. At one of my appointments - the last one I had with him, actually - I had to get six cavities filled, and although he gave me nitrous and novocaine I still started to cry and resist. He blew his top and scared the poo out of me - I don’t remember exactly what happened since I was loopy from the gas, but as I mentioned it was the last time my family ever saw this dentist, so… Anyway, the smell of nitrous, particularly combined with that clove smell of dentists’ offices, is a serious anxiety trigger for me, and though I’ve never yet said No Thanks to a shot of novocaine I don’t want anything more.
However, I’ve had one root canal so far, and something odd happened. During the first part, with half my face out to lunch from the novo, a mouth full of latex and packing cotton, and the stupid metal thing holding my jaws wide open, I suddenly started feeling strange, like I wasn’t really where this was happening. I seemed to be half-asleep, and time passed relatively quickly. When he had finished up the dentist started speaking to me like you’d talk to a little kid who didn’t want to get out of bed, and I pulled myself back to normal. Dentist explained that I’d managed to put myself into a sort of hypnotic state, and that this happens from time to time, and I shouldn’t be frightened. Very weird, but it got me through the bad part.
Unfortunately I haven’t managed to do it again, not even for root canal part 2, but that’s generally quicker and a lot less painful anyway. I suspect it’s like Arthur Dent and flying - you can only do it if you’re not trying to.
I do. I stocked up when I was in Mexico, specifically so that I would have it on hand for any/all dentist appointments! 10 pills should last me 4 or 5 years, so yes, it’s sitting around the house all the time.
Thanks.
In which case, in the UK, I’d bet it’s extremely unusual to have sedation for dental work, including root canals. It certainly was never suggested for me, for anything, and my daughter doesn’t even have a local anaesthetic for fillings.
But if you need something to calm your nerves, and it doesn’t conflict with the anaesthetic or any other drugs you might need, then why not?