Thankful

We had a lovely Thanksgiving. We raised our own turkey this year and had a few friends and family over. I still have the temporary teeth in, they said my permanent ones will take a bit longer because of how many there were. My entire adult life, I have had bad teeth. My permanent teeth all came in with funny spots on them and they were so brittle and chipped and broke easily.

I always promised myself that I would save up and fix them one of these days, but every time I got a little money saved up it seemed like another emergency came along and my teeth once again took the back burner.

After my last child, my teeth started getting worse than they had ever been. One of my molars cracked in half, causing some pretty excruciating pain. I was able to get a dentist to pull it and then another one started to split and also had to be pulled. I had a hole in one of my molars which I had fixed at a free dental clinic. They put in too large of a filling and left the root exposed, leaving that tooth vulnerable and painful when anything hot, cold, sweet, or if air touched it.

They asked what my needs were and at first I didn’t even know how to answer. I’m so used to taking care of everyone else that I don’t even know what I need half the time.

Dental care came up and it was a quick, resounding ‘Yes! That’s exactly what I need!’ 

The cost to make my mouth functional was absolutely astounding! At first, I thought “There is no way they are going to cover this“ but, Angie actually reached out to several other organizations on my behalf to get everyone to chip in and help cover the costs! I couldn’t believe it. It was like a dream come true. There are many organizations out there that help veterans, but not nearly as many that help those caring for our veterans.

It’s easy for me to put my needs on the back burner in order to take care of my husband and my kids, but for once, someone wanted to help take care of me! What a wonderful feeling that was! I can now chew and eat and enjoy foods that I loved, but avoided due to the pain it caused in my mouth. I’m not afraid to smile too big anymore. I went out and bought lipstick. I had always avoided lipstick because it drew attention to my mouth. I know it’s a little, trivial thing, but it’s kind of a big deal to me! I can’t say enough good things about this foundation and what they did for me!”