Six down, two to go

I have been plotting and scheming how to accomplish safely having the toxic amalgam fillings taken out of my mouth since we first received Big O and my urine porphyrins test results in January 2008.

I have spent a lot of time researching mercury toxicity and amalgam dental fillings. I have spent a lot of time learning about safe and unsafe methods of removal of mercury-containing dental amalgam. I have spent a lot of time debating in my own scientific mind whether this was all a bunch of hoopla or if it was truly possible that the amalgam fillings that have been in my mouth since my childhood have been slowly emitting toxic mercury into my body over the years and that this amount of mercury was stealthily affecting my health. It has been upsetting me to think it was possible that the stores of mercury throughout my body were pulled into my womb, infiltrating my placenta and my growing baby’s tissues during my pregnancies.

It’s been nagging at me that the dentist in Virginia that replaced an old amalgam while Big O was but a few-months-old-nursling was completely in compliance with currently accepted protocol in the U.S. Stupidly Naïvely, the only thing I thought to ask about was the anesthetic. This dentist assured me that not even the anesthetic would be problematic in my breastmilk, but that if I wanted to pump-and-dump between my appointment and feeding Big O next, this would be more than sufficient to protect my baby from any harm done during my dental visit.

After learning what I’ve learned as a non-dental professional about mercury in amalgams, I have been in awe that it could even be possible that that dentist can truly be so naïve about the harm not only to my newborn breastfeeding baby, but to myself, with the reckless ADA-approved amalgam removal. (The FDA had added a warning to it’s website - which, by the way, has now been replaced with a much less direct and inconclusive notice regarding a recent FDA decision.)

And then, after a lot of curiosity and wondering, I learned more and I got angry. Really, really angry. This is MERCURY we are talking about. Mercury. As in ‘mad as a hatter’ mercury. As in brain damaging, lethally toxic mercury. And it is put it in children’s mouths in the form of amalgam fillings in the U.S. to this day. It is a disgrace.

I cringe to think how often a new amalgam is placed in a child’s mouth each day in our country. I cringe to think of how often a new amalgam filling is placed in American’s mouths each day. I cringe to think of how often an amalgam filling is improperly and unsafely removed each day.

My mouth was full of them. My earliest memories of going to a dentist involve getting cavities drilled and filled. I used to get tense and grasp the arm rest on the chair, and stare at the lights on the ceiling while in the dentist’s chair – from start to finish. I remember having shavings and bits of metallic stuff stuck to my tongue and scratching my throat. I remember swallowing little pieces as I tried not to gag during the procedures.

As an adult, the fillings began to require replacement due to their age and more recently developed decay. During the first few replacements with dentists who took no amalgam removal precautions, before I knew enough, I can remember having large pieces of amalgam slide far back in my throat to inescapably be swallowed. I would scream inside my head – suction!! suction!!!!!! please, suction back there!!!! But with hands and drills inside my mouth, no words, or even sounds, would actually be created and those toxic bits of metal slithered down to make their way through my GI tract. (At least I hope they made it through and did not get stuck somewhere in there along the way. I’ve read one story of someone who had an amalgam stuck in their gall bladder, confirmed via x-ray.)

And, to think, I didn’t even realize or appreciate the atrocity of what was happening. Until now.

Six down, two to go. Saturday will be the day that the final amalgam filling comes out and the only crown I currently have will be replaced. (The crown must be replaced because there is a very good chance that there is amalgam underneath it and to eliminate all metal from my mouth.) It has been taxing – a strain on my body and a drain on our budget – but I am so looking forward to being amalgam-free and beginning my chelation journey.

I hope to find time to write more about the actual amalgam removal process that I’ve been going through (with a wonderful holistic dentist) and to certainly keep you posted on the mercury chelation/detoxification process. Stay tuned.