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Assault is defined as "a physical attack".

When a female claims that she has been assaulted, this is often in reference to sexual assault. I have never been sexually assaulted. However, I have been assaulted, and as one might expect, it's left lasting psychological scars.

In other words, I finally figured out why I'm so freaking terrified of needles a few weeks back. The pattern of events which directly lead to the fear was basically an assault.

When I was eleven, I had to get teeth pulled. Because I was eleven, the orthodontist decided this should happen under general anesthesia. I was already predisposed to not liking dentists, for reasons I never quite understood but by then largely had under control -- the fact that my dentist had seen literally three generations of my family, lived up the street from us, and made regular small talk about our respective dogs (a yorkie and a spitz named Fuzzy at the time) helped. I was also terrified of anesthesia.

This could have been dealt with. Probably.

It was not dealt with well.

It really wasn't dealt with well.


For one, I don't actually know why those teeth had to be pulled. Three were baby teeth. It says something about my terror that I'd yanked three baby teeth out myself the day they became even slightly loose (WELL before they were ready to actually come out, judging by the blood). The remaining tooth was an impacted molar. I've since come to understand that standard procedure would be to make a small incision in the gum, stick a bracket on the sucker and on surrounding teeth, and guide it in. It would've been unpleasant as ********, but the way my orthodontist wanted to do it was to pull the tooth and give me an implant in later life.

I have since taken steps to make the implant something that will never ever happen. I hope there was a good reason for him wanting to do things that way, but I don't know that.

Anyway.

For another reason, in the room for the surgery, I went into hysterics when they wanted to give me the IV with the anesthesia. Because I was eleven and ******** terrified of anesthesia, of having people yank around in my mouth, of having anyone do anything to me at all while I was unconscious.

To calm me down, a reasonable authority figure could have explained exactly what was going to happen, exactly why what was going to happen, was going to happen, and could have otherwise treated me like a goddamn human being with a brain!

But they didn't.

They threatened to hold me down.

They would have held me down.

I still can't ******** write this without ******** sobbing. I should be writing an essay, but I have to get this out because I can't stop thinking about it, it's been over ten years now and I can't stop thinking about it.

Then, they did the things I was most scared of: literally anything while I was under anesthesia. To make matters worse, I had nightmares the whole time. I'm told this isn't a usual reaction. I had nightmares of a dentist pulling my teeth. I wasn't aware -- that would've been better, horrible but better. No, I had nightmares of a giant rat with a saw going after my teeth.

And nobody apologized.

Nobody realized that what they did was wrong.

I'm told that nowadays, parents are teaching kids that nobody can violate their bodily autonomy for any reason -- like, say, hugging without consent -- without their permission. Hugging is pretty tame compared to threatening to hold down an eleven year old and knock them out.


I did get an apology of sorts, eventually. Honestly, bless my current dentist. He knows how terrified I am of needles, and bless him. He also knows that mold making stuff can make me vomit. I'm really sorry about that one, actually. It wasn't anyone's fault, and I really didn't want to vomit on anyone.

He saw I was having a panic attack when they were going to pull my wisdom teeth. He gave me some time to collect myself, didn't make me take anesthesia and probably figured out I had some Issues when I also refused a sedative. He also let me explain what was wrong (as best I could through my terror) and why I was so scared now. He also made a concerted effort to keep me informed of everything he was doing, at all times.

And he acknowledged that I had been wronged.

He's not the guy who hurt me. He's not related to hte guy who hurt me in anything but his profession. I am, quite frankly, a nightmare for anyone who has to give me an injection or stick a needle in me -- I managed to keep it together for a woman who took blood once, but then fainted on the floor afterwards so THAT'S a fun reaction to know I have... it's an unrelated physical phenomenon that runs in families, apparently. Also bless the poor woman who had to give me a TB test. Both of those were before I had my wisdom teeth out...

I think I might be a little bit better now.

And, see, here's the thing I worked out a really long time ago:

I'm not actually scared of needles. I sew, a lot, and have regularly stuck myself with needles and pins by mistake. It hurts, it sometimes bleeds, it's annoying, but it doesn't phase me more than some mild swearing. More than that, I actually pierced my own ear once. That involved sticking a needle in and through my own ear, and it took about half an hour to work the damn thing all the way through. Earlobes are surprisingly tough. I didn't freak out too badly about having blood taken, despite the fact that I fainted afterwards. I was actually trying to congratulate myself for not freaking out (more than a normal amount) when I realized I something was badly wrong.

No, I'm scared of anesthesia, largely because I associate it with being assaulted. It resembles a different kind of fear, because fear of needles is relatively common. However, the underlying cause and mechanism are something entirely different. It's fear of being attacked. It's fear of being touched without consent. It's fear of someone telling me to grit my teeth and get through something and that something turning out to be much worse than anyone could've imagined, and then everyone acting like it's somehow my fault for being scared of needles.

It's kind of hard to come to terms with that. Surprisingly so. Saying "I'm afraid of needles" is a much more simple idea than "I was assaulted with my parents' knowledge and consent at age eleven".

But, knowledge is power. You can't solve a problem without first understanding what the problem is.