Saturday, August 23, 2008

Cape Is Not a Flying Toy

During his last routine check up, Braedyn had a not so good diagnosis. I couldn’t believe it! I was outraged! I always read the labels on everything! I completely watch his intake! After arguing with everyone in the office about how this could have happened, I gave in to the truth of it all. The sad, sad truth. My son had a cavity.

I was really bummed. I felt like I had failed him somehow. We don’t have junk food in the house, or at least nothing with high fructose corn syrup and such. I only give him juice that was 100% juice, and I watered it down to boot. (Yes, I have the house my kids’ friends won’t want to hang out at after school for a snack. Sorry guys!) He got the cavity and didn’t even get to eat the junk food to get it.

I was told because of where it was and how deep it was, they would not be able to fill it with a nice white filling, but it would have to be silver. I wasn’t too freaked out about this, after all it is a baby tooth, and I always had silver fillings as a kid. Then I was told he would have to be given a sedative before hand and nitrous gas during the procedure. At this, I freaked. I got online and researched the drug they wanted to use. I called his pediatrician and asked about it. Twice. I was so completely sick-to-my-stomach worried about this that Greg had take him for the first part of the appointment, the sedative part.

By the time I got there, he was already in the back getting the work done. Parents weren’t allowed to go back with the kids, so Greg and I sat in the waiting room and well, waited. After he’d been back there for about 45 minutes, we heard this deep, guttural groan/scream. I glanced at Greg and we looked knowingly at each other. That was our son. I watched the office staff close the door to the back to help muffle the sound. To confirm my suspicion, I asked the staff if that was Braedyn. They went and checked on him and came back with the news that yes, it was him, but he wasn’t “sad”. I was told he was “more angry and tired of having the work done.” The unwelcome sick-to-my-stomach worry came back.

Not too long after that, the hygienists brought him out to a private room where we comforted our very tearful and sad little boy. We looked in his mouth and didn’t see a filling. Nope. Not a filling. A whole damn cap. Our son had bling and I wasn’t thrilled. Why wasn’t I told he would have a cap? To comfort him we plastered smiles on our faces and said, “Wow! You have a robot tooth!” He lit up.

A few days passed, and his lips finally healed from chewing on them when they were high on Novocain. A few days after that, I thought I’d floss his teeth, which we do every day now. As soon as I touched his robot tooth, his hands flew up to his face and tears sprung from his eyes. I had hurt him?! I hugged him like a good mamma bear would and decided ok, I won’t try THAT again for a few more days. Well, three or four days later, I tried again. Same results. A few days after that, same results. I called the dentist office and I was told it could take a couple of weeks before the angry tooth would take a chill. I know my son. I knew something wasn’t right, but I waited out the couple of weeks and called again. We set an appointment to have his robot tooth looked at. This appointment was yesterday.

I knew it wasn’t going to be easy the second we walked in and Braedyn started complaining about the smell in the office. And I was right. I didn’t get any easier.

The dentist flossed the tooth and got the same results as me. He looked around the tooth with his little mirror and couldn’t see any reason for the tears. I almost felt like he was a bit annoyed with my son’s reaction which ruffled my mommy feathers, so I kept pushing. “It is obvious this hurts him.” “It’s been three weeks.” He suggested I wait another five days or so and try flossing again. I kind of got the feeling he wanted to be done with this check up. After all, he couldn’t see anything. Well, that just wasn’t going to fly with this mamma bear. I kept pushing. Kept asking questions. Flabbergasted, he informed me he’d done thousands and thousands of these and never had a kid come back. I pushed more. Finally, one of the hygienists asked if an x-ray might show something. He conceded and said, “Sure. Let’s take a look.”

After staring at the dark spot in the x-ray that was lodged between his robot tooth and his back tooth, I felt like I was victorious. See? He’s not fibbing. He’s not being dramatic for the sake of being dramatic. Something was there, and the simple act of putting pressure on it, even from floss, hurt him. The dentist said it was a piece of glue from when they put the cap on. And it was deep. To get it out they would have to numb him and give him some gas.

I wanted to get this done, so I did what any good mom would do. I used bribery. I said if we got through this today, we’d go get that Batman costume he wanted. The one with the wings that pop out, creating a 5 foot wing span. He gave me the toothiest grin ever and promised, “I’ll be brave!” I gave the go ahead to the tooth crew, and here’s how it went down:

Cotton in the mouth: Screams. Tears.
Grape flavored gas: Screams. Tears.
Needle in the mouth: Screams. Tears. Blood. Flailing. Two sets of hands holding him down.
Bent needle coming out of his mouth: Tears. Blood.
Singing the Spiderman song in his ear: Calm. Slowing of tears.
Chat about Batman costume: Not working. Tears.
Digging out the glue: Tears. Screams. Blood. Three sets of hands holding him down.
Driving away: Non-stop talk that went something like this, “Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman. Batman.”

On the way from the store, I realized I probably could have bribed him with a couple of 99 cent Hot Wheels rather than a $40 costume. Oh well. My boy was happy.

IMG_0633

And I’m so grateful for the directions that came with the suit that said in big, bold letters:

CAPE IS NOT A FLYING TOY 

IMG_0631Phew! Otherwise I was thinking of teaching Braedyn to climb up to the roof and jump.

6 comments:

  1. WHAT?? Not a flying toy, but.. it has wings and its Batman and.. crap, I was so ready to give the thing a test run from the roof after the kids went down for nap time.

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  2. I dont care... I say lets see if a person can really fly with those wings. Im sure they only posted that warning because some one stubbed thier toe and the lawyers want them to do it. I call first dibs.

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  3. Found you from Brad & Amy's twitter pages. This is just like my son's experience at his dentist, except he has two caps! Ungh. I hate them and myself for letting it happen. Oh well. Good for you for pressing the doc, too!

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  4. michellereno, I'd LOVE to know who your son's dentist is. Maybe it's the same as mine?

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  5. My son's dentist is Dr Austin's in Sparks. I don't remember the name of the exact dentist who did the work, but they're the only one covered by our insurance. Blech.

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  6. Doh! I'm a dork... My previous post (now deleted) came right as I was making dinner and I wasn't thinking (obviously). That's not the dentist we went to. Thank you for your post; I now know another one to avoid in my quest for our next (and hopefully perfect) pediatric dentist!

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