When Summer Ends, What We Leave Behind Matters

Summer is winding down here in Texas, although the heat clearly didn’t get the memo. ☀️🥵

The days are getting shorter, another season is changing, and it has me thinking about the seasons of my own life — especially my years in dentistry.

I remember becoming a hygienist and thinking that I was prepared.

I wasn’t.

One of my first lessons?

I put a patient’s glasses on and suddenly thought I was having a stroke. 😂 Everything looked completely distorted. (Definitely an "eye opener" to slow down and set boundaries)

Thankfully, his eyes were closed. I continued to care for him anyways...despite the stressful situations that the office put me in.

Hope-ism #1: Never underestimate somebody else’s prescription glasses.

But the funny moments weren’t always enough to make the reality of dentistry feel okay.

Overbooked.

Understaffed.

Running behind.

Trying to provide exceptional patient care while watching the clock and feeling the pressure of production.

I wasn’t prepared for that.

And truthfully, to this day, dental still upsets me.

Not dentistry itself.

The disconnect.

We can say we want what’s best for our patients, and I believe many dental professionals genuinely do.

But when the schedule is packed and the numbers are driving the day, sometimes the person sitting in the chair gets lost. (Plus...the mental health and physical demands on dental teams are hard on the bodies and mind.)

And here’s my Hope-ism #2: A patient is not a production number with a mouth attached.

They’re a person.

And that person may be carrying years of fear.

Maybe they watched their parents avoid the dentist.

Maybe they were shamed about their teeth.

Maybe they experienced pain and nobody listened.

Maybe they were told, “Don’t be scared,” when what they really needed was someone to say, “I believe you.”

That’s where generational dental fear comes in.

Fear doesn’t always start with the person sitting in our chair.

Sometimes we’re meeting the third generation of that fear.

Hope-ism #3: You can’t shame someone out of a fear they learned to survive with.

I’ve spent decades on both sides of that chair.

I understand the pressure dental teams face.

But I also understand that patient care isn’t just about completing the procedure.

It’s about how that person feels while they’re there.

Hope-ism #4: Sometimes the best clinical intervention is simply slowing down long enough to listen.

So as another Texas summer comes to an end, I’m thinking about what I want the next season to look like.

Less rushing.

More listening.

Less “just get through the appointment.”

More “what does this patient need?”

Because we may forget the appointment details years from now.

But patients remember how we made them feel.

And that’s my biggest Hope-ism of all:

You don’t have to fix everything to give someone hope. Sometimes you just have to make them feel safe enough to try again.

The heat will eventually break.

Summer will eventually end.

But the experiences we give people?

Those can stay with them for a lifetime.

💗 Hope