Tooth trauma

I have bad teeth. Bad as in prone to cavities even though I brush and take care of them. Hubby on the other hand has great teeth. 34 years old and never has had a cavity in his life. I can count on one hand the number of times he's been to the dentist in the 16 years I've been with him. I go every 6 months. It's clearly hereditary and he got the luckier hand. Of our 4 kids they seem to be split in who's teeth they got. Well, as far as the health of their teeth. Unfortunately, I'm thinking they all got my too-many-big-teeth-in-a-not-quite-big-enough-mouth-so-we'll-jumble-and-look-goofy teeth. Poor kids. As far as healthy teeth go though, Madi and Sadie seem to have it made. Neither of them have had a cavity yet. Then there are Eli and Teagan. Eli's had a number of fillings already and I'm sure there are more in his future.

Then there is Teagan. I've spoken before about her tooth woes and our endless trips to the Pediadontist in Oklahoma City. I had so hoped that the crowns would protect her little sick teeth and she'd eventually lose them and big healthy grown-up teeth would come in. No such luck. If things continue this way for her then she's in for a future of spending a fortune at the dentist.

She started complianing on Friday afternoon that her tooth hurt. It was one of the silver crowns, part of what we call her grill. She's got enough silver in that mouth to melt it down and make one heck of a fancy necklace. Of course, what can you do about a toothache on a Friday afternoon? Pretty much nothing but wait until the dentist opens again on Monday. Then because Monday was a holiday and apparently >the day to be at the dentist we took the first available appointment yesterday. I took her to a friend here in town to see if he could pinpoint the problem before taking an entire day off to drive to OKC.

After having an x-ray taken Dr. Zach pulled me aside to tell me that Teagan had an infection under her tooth and the tooth would have to be removed. He was willing to move things around and do it right then so we told Teagan he was going to "wriggle" her tooth out. That didn't go over so well. She's never lost a tooth before and I'm not sure that she'll ever tell me if she has a loose one even if she does after her experience yesterday. I was smart enough to go sit out in the waiting area so she wouldn't be looking at me with her big sad eyes and crocodile tears. Bless her heart, I could hear her screaming all the way in the front of the building. She drew quite a crowd of nurses and office employees to the door wondering what was going on.

Luckily, we got it out and Dr. Zach said the infection all came out with the tooth. Gross! He said it wasn't really that uncommon because when she'd had the crown originally put on they had done sort of a mini root canal. Because this was on a baby tooth they couldn't dig too deep without the risk of harming the adult tooth so there were some tiny little holes left that bacteria apparently got in.



The nurse cleaned the tooth off and put it in a very fun glow-in-the-dark tooth holder that Teagan carried around with her all day. I'm not sure I've ever seen a tooth quite as big as this one that came from Teagan's little mouth...silver crown, root and all!

Luckily we didn't have any tooth fairy issues like we've had in the past. I think that probation letter we sent the tooth fairy a while back after she made one too many mistakes must have scared her straight. At least for now.

So Teagan is the proud new owner of a $10 bill (Mommy told the tooth fairy she really did deserve a little something extra for all she'd been through). She also got to wear Sadie's bracelet that has a cute little polymer clay girl-tooth on it to school today so she could share her news with her class.