There goes another thousand bucks I don’t have

To the dentist today for cleaning and checkup, the first time in eleven years (first there was no insurance for several years, then there were other things that needed seeing to more urgently).  The dentist and hygienist both remarked that for someone who hadn’t been in for that long, I was in remarkably good shape.  The hygienist chiseled off the first layer of tartar, and scheduled a follow-up for tomorrow week to finish.

Then the dentist got down to what he did find:  that #30 (lower-right primary molar) appears to have some new decay under the enamel and will need to be drilled out and re-filled, and #15 (upper-left secondary molar) has cracked—not cracked through, fortunately, but needing major work.  He told me he hoped to get away with a medial-occlusal-frontal filling, which would preserve a good deal of the tooth and avoid having to do a crown, but if the cracks went too far, crowning might be required.  In the worst case, crowning #15 and filling #30 would cost between $900 and $1,000 out of my pocket.  If he can do an MOF filling on #15, the cost comes down to $350 out-of-pocket.  Neither of which sums I have.

(ETA:  weight today: 250 pounds.  That’s a good ten pounds lighter than I thought I was, but I still have too much hanging on round my waist, so my shirts still don’t fit properly.)