Thursday May 7, 2009 11:33 PM

Jim went back to Dr. New Guy’s office a couple of weeks ago. His implants had now healed long enough for them to start to make his new teeth. They called him that morning and asked if he could come in early because they had a cancellation, so they wound up cramming what they would have normally done in two visits into one. I didn’t go with him so I didn’t see what they did, but Jim was impressed when he got home. They were very, very thorough and meticulous in the way they took these impressions. They put this contraption on his head like a metal frame…Jim tried to describe it but the only picture I’m getting in my mind is this:



And Jim says it looked more like this:



But in reality, it was something like this:



…and they put the tray in with the goop, measured, took the tray out, more goop went in, back into the mouth, measured again…Jim was there for over an hour. He said that when Vanni took the impressions it was just one shot in with the tray and that was that- no crazy looking contraptions of any kind. These guys were absolutely meticulous. When Jim got home, they called and asked if he had time to come back in because they were ready to do the next phase. Of course he ran right over. He just went back for another visit yesterday and they did some try-ons…with the finished teeth on the bottom screwed into the implants, and the wax model on the top. Jim said the lower teeth felt fabulous, which would seem natural since they’re screwed right into the jaw. His uppers will be a regular denture, and Jim said he couldn’t really judge if the model felt better than Vanni’s did because they’re not held in place with anything. Once they had the paraphernalia stuffed into his mouth a crew of Dr. New Guy’s cronies all came in and were looking him over. One of them said something to the effect of “Well, if it were me, I’d move that up a millimeter…let’s adjust the seventh mandibular…blah blah blah blah…(more dentist talk).” No way did that kind of perfection go into anything Vanni did. Let’s keep our fingers crossed everything looks and feels and works good.

Now onto a monumentous occasion…..trumpets please….Jim ate his first sandwich since his surgery two years ago, and he didn’t choke on it or cough it back up afterwards. Now, I don’t think he could eat ANY sandwich, but this was a Subway tuna sub which has soft bread and mushy tuna. A long time ago Jim had said that he really missed tuna from Subway. Here he is with his sammich:



I really never thought we'd be two years down the line and this was his first sandwich, but Jim's learned to adjust his expectations. Maybe it's that or the Lexapro.

Next week he goes back to Dr. New Guy.