It Could Be Worse . . .

Susan Heavilin
Sep 15
2 min read

I have a dentist appointment next week. Nothing against the dentist but I don't like going. Never have, never will.

Could have something to do with no pain killer for the first years of my life. Sure, they gave me novacaine but in those days, they didn't know the correlation between redheads and pain relief. Redheads need 20% more anesthesia than blonds or brunettes. They didn't figure this one out until well into the 2000s. So I have a good reason to not like going to the dentist.

But it could be worse. Dentists do try to make your visit as pleasant as possible.

If you're a horse, it's not so pleasant.

Being a rather large animal, they need to be restrained to a certain degree.

First, they're drugged out of their mind.

And then their mouth is forced open and held open with this rather barbaric-looking device. It's not like you can tell a horse to "open wide, now!"

My horses had to have their teeth "floated" or filed down recently so they could better chew their hay. I felt their pain.

My vet, Larry Martin, is a very kind man and gentle on my horses. At 6'4", he can easily wrestle them and get them under control. He was the doctor when Brady was born so Brady has been dealing with Dr. Martin since he was a colt. Steps right in line.

Vladimir was the first patient. Teeth were good but like a lot of people when they get older, he has gum problems. The good news is that now his gums get sprayed with red wine daily. The tannins in the wine help with the gum disease. That's a good excuse for all of you oldsters to drink more red wine!

Click on images to enlarge.

Brady was next. He likes dental work about as much as I do. I wonder if it's because he's also a redhead or a chestnut in horse speak. My exact color in fact. I'll have to check that one out.

Once when I was riding, a car stopped and wanted to know if he could ask a question. I said sure and he asked "Do you dye your hair to match your horse?" I replied "No, I dye my horse to match my hair!" He was still laughing as he drove off.

Back to Brady's dentistry session . . . he was not liking it at all. But he "got her done" and then fell promptly to sleep.