“Change the changeable, accept the unchangeable, and remove yourself from the unacceptable.” ~Denis Waitley
Perhaps it’s the nature of the work I do, and the awareness it lends to my life, or maybe it’s simply age and a more distant horizon in the rear-view mirror, but the longer I live, the more the cyclical nature of life impresses itself upon me: how the universe offers us second chances, opportunities to revisit old events, make different choices; like do-overs, or at least, do-agains.
Story time
Several decades ago, when my children were still youngsters, the root of an upper left molar became terribly infected.
My dentist wanted to avoid pulling the tooth at my age then. He explained that treatment required a complicated root canal and a crown.
It also required a shot (or six) of Novacain inserted down into the root itself.
I literally almost passed out from the pain.
I’ve smashed a knee, crashed a motorcycle, and given birth naturally, twice, but I had never experienced anything that intense before.
I remember thinking: I hope I never, ever feel that kind of pain again.
Fast forward a few decades
A month ago (or maybe two…or three), I noticed that trying to chew anything hard (nuts and the like) on the left side of my mouth was becoming uncomfortable. It wasn’t painful, simply annoying. I thought that the crown on that same upper left molar might have come loose.
No big deal, but time to see a dentist.
However, visiting the mouth carpenter isn’t one of my favourite things, and there was COVID, and then the holiday season was upon us, so I avoided doing anything about it. Eventually, I got used to chewing on the right side of my mouth.
Ain’t that the way with most pain? Whether physical or emotional, personal or professional, we build workarounds, alternatives, coping strategies.
Then, while visiting my mother, who had a dentist appointment last week, I tagged along and they squeezed me in for an ex-ray.
It was not a loose crown. No, the root had cracked, allowing bacteria to creep in causing a nasty infection.
So nasty, in fact, the dentist was shocked my cheek hadn’t bloated to the size of a baseball.
So nasty, he said, that I wouldn’t have made it back to Canada, that the infection would have quickly spread and blown up into sepsis.
God bless all dentists.
There was no alternative: the tooth had to go.
The extraction, despite the five shots of Novocain and the nitrous oxide, was still, um, distinctly uncomfortable.
Okay, it was painful—most especially so when the last shot entered the infection pocket. For one excruciating moment, I thought I’d pass out.
Same tooth, same pain, twenty-seven years later.
To wrap it up
And in that moment, recognizing the full-circle-ness of the moment and greeting it as a different, fuller person (I hope), I made another choice: to never, ever, ever again ignore the warning signs of a worsening situation—to avoid impending calamity by calling it discomfort, or inconvenient, or not bad enough yet. Whether physical or emotional, technical or interpersonal, I swore silently, avoidance is now extracted from my strategy arsenal.
Yet, most of us do this, avoid, when something hurts but we don’t want it to, or we’re too proud, or stubborn, or strong to admit it.
Or too invested in being right, or too defensive to seek solutions, or too eager to evade.
Or don’t want to make the situation worse, or “rock the boat” or get in trouble.
So we build work-arounds, avoidance techniques, placations and blind eyes.
Avoidance is just another word for fear—an emotional bacteria.
The bottom-line
The truth is, sometimes you need to leave a job.
Sometimes you have to end a relationship.
Sometimes you must speak up.
And sometimes, a tooth must be removed.
Else you’ll meet ’em all again, in one form or another, down the road somewhere.
“When life brings you full circle, pay attention. There’s a lesson there.” ~Mandy Hale
