Dentaphobia

I have been fearful of dentist for about the past 15-20 years.  For my first 30 so years of life I loved going to the dentist.  I never had cavities and I never had to have full on braces.  When I was in 2nd grade I had chicken pox and somehow got one on the gum in front of my lower front teeth.  When it went away it left an area of exposed teeth.  They had to do a skin graph - cutting skin from the rough of my mouth and sewing it to the patch of area that had exposed teeth.  To this day I still have an area that is still white (the skin that was graphed never changed colors) so it looks like I have teeth growing out of my gums.  But even that experience didn't turn me off to going to the dentist.
When I was in my early 30's I had my first cavity filled.  For some reason my mouth does not numb the way other people's mouths do.  It turns out my nerves run differently so I felt a lot of that cavity being filled.  In my late 30's I had a root canal and similar to the cavity I was feeling a lot of what was happening.  I had to keep raising my hand to tell the Dr. that I was feeling it.  Finally the Dr. had to shoot anesthesia straight into my nerve ending.  IT WAS PAINFUL!!  So, yes, I have a fear of dentist.  After Benjamin was born and my life was crazy busy I went over 2 or 3 years without seeing a dentist.  Then I had to go for 3 separate appointments where they had to (try to) numb me in order to "deep clean".
I actually REALLY like my Seattle dentist as a person I just despise going to the dentist.  I get all worked up and I know a lot of it is in my head but I just really don't like it.
Here in Germany we have a really great dentist as well.  It is a kid's dentist primarily but they do see adults.  We all went last year and so Marty and I went recently for a 6 month cleaning,  scheduling the kids for a few weeks out because after school appointments are hard to come by.  They said I needed composites on several of my teeth which would require numbing.  They speak English fairly well, certainly better than my German but I wanted them to know that I don't numb the way most people do.  They reassured me that they have ways around it.
The day of the appointment came and I was nervous and a bit sick to my stomach. They were SO SO super kind to me.  They could tell I was nervous so they gave me a stuffed animal to hug.  Which,
even though I looked babyish, I did.  They asked me often if I was OK and rubbed my cheek and my arm often telling me it was going to be OK and how far into the process we were.  It was not pleasant, I won't lie, but it wasn't awful.   At one point she asked if I could feel it and I said yes.  She said, "well, I knew we needed enough numbing agent for a baby elephant but maybe we need enough for a full grown elephant" and she gave me more.
And although it wasn't overly painful, my face was completely numb.  It was so strange.  I rode my bike home with cheeks

flapping in the wind and slobber dripping out of my mouth and hitting me on the cheek.  I felt just like a dog with their head out the car window.
I tried to go to lunch with Marty but ended up biting my tongue more than eating my food so I saved it for dinner.
Oh, and for the record, because health and dental seems to cost so much less here: For the 15 composites (and enough anesthesia for a full grown elephant)  we were charged 1,700€.  Our insurance paid 1,400€ and we were stuck with just 300€ which also included my cleaning.