Class 2 Exam

I was nervous about today, even more than normal, because not only was my patient a class 2 but I declared her an exam. This was her second appt, so I needed to complete everything. She has also smoked for about 13 years, so everything seemed a little harder. I wanted to practice with my Gracey curets today but it was so hard to get under her tissue and I am sure that was due to the smoking and the tightening of the tissue. Once I was done scaling I was feeling very good about things. There were a couple of areas that I was not sure about, but for the most part I was feeling really good. However, I didn't stay that way for very long. As my instructor started to check I was frustrated with some of the areas that I missed-- a total of 8. I have never missed that many locations and was not happy with myself. I was able to feel them with my instructor's help and got all of them on my second try. After my patient left I was really struggling with the situation especially since I declared an exam, but my instructor came over and told me that I did a really good job. She told me that the calculus that was left was minimal for how much build up she had to begin with. My instructor also told me that due to the tenatiousness of the calculus my patient could have almost been a class 3. After discussing the situation with my instructor I felt much better about life.
I am not going to say that it was my greatest experience, but I will say that it was a learning one. I will know for next time the areas on which I need to concentrate.