Changing my Dentist

Here's the problem I'm facing: my husband and I are changing dentists and I'm trying to get his dental records from the old office to the new office.

Yesterday, one of the staff at our new dentist called and left the old dentist a message. The old office never got back to her, so this morning I called the old dentist to see if they would fax me the form for my husband to sign to have his records, specifically his x-rays, sent to the new office. The 12-year-old on the phone told me there was nothing to sign and that they would just fax them to the new place.

I was a bit skeptical of this, as I had to sign something a few weeks ago to have my records sent, but since this was even easier for me, I crossed my fingers...and was foiled again by the stupidity of others.

I emailed the lovely woman, Laurie, at the new dentist's asking her to let me know if she received the fax, and of course by lunchtime she hadn't. So I called the old dentist again, which is when I found out that the 12-year-old, named Priscilla, was, in fact, wrong. And that they couldn't get a hold of me because they didn't have my phone number, which I find inconceivable, since I know I wrote it on the form when I went to see them back in March, but maybe literacy is overrated in their office.

At any rate, I asked Priscilla to send me the form...which she did...sort of. She sent me a form, but not the right form. So I called back again, and spoke with someone else. At this point, I was feeling rather hysterical about all of this...apparently dealing with morons moves me to hysteria at warp speed. So I took on that tone. You know, the one your mom used and you knew if you put one toe out of line things worse than you could possibly imagine would happen to you. Not because I'm any real threat to the dentist's office, but mostly it was as close as I could come to sounding calm about this whole ordeal.

As I'm reading what I'm writing, it sounds an awful lot to me like I'm overreacting. Which is possible. I've had such unprofessional and frustrating experiences with the old dentist in the past that it is really hard for me to remain calm about this.

As I'm writing this, I'm thinking to myself, this situation is making me really not happy. And, I'm thinking of making my third New Year's resolution to actively be happier. I know I'll feel happier when I'm done dealing with the old dentist. Although my anticipation of this future happiness is probably greater than the actual happiness because 1: it always is, and 2: I'll just have other things to deal with.

So, I have the wonderful benefit of working in an office where I'm allowed to use my cell phone, and send faxes, and basically deal with my life as long as I get my work done. Thus I was able to communicate this fiasco to my husband.

I'm sure you'd like to know the resolution of a day spent trying to get people to do their job: hubby walked into the office (in my imagination, with his gun belt on, but it's really possible that it wasn't) and walked out five minutes later with his file.