not so nightmare-y dental experience

if there is one piece of knowledge that i have gleaned from being a mother it is THAT YOU WILL NEVER ESCAPE MOTHER-GUILT. i mean there's all kinds of other things to say about being a parent but right know im knee deep in mama-guilt. primarily because olive had a tooth abscess and while of course it's not my fault, i feel like i should have seen the signs and gotten her into the dentist sooner. in april she had a cavity filled and it was awful! HORRIBLE!

so maybe two months ago i started feeling suspicious that her tooth was looking discolored. the way i knew she had a cavity somewhere was that her breath was smelly. well that smell never really went away but i reasoned that it was just "something". well it was. turns out they didn't clear out all of the bacteria from the cavity space and now the root is infected. a pocket (like this one and in that same spot) had been created full of what im sure is totally foul pus and it had to be drained along with having the tooth extracted.

the dentist we went to before was not a pediatric dentist and they didn't have gas for her to relax with so we went somewhere else.

i am so sad and mama-bearing it all. i feel guilty and worried on her behalf. like, what if someone makes fun of her? what if she feels self conscious? what if she starts smiling with her mouth closed because of this? IT MAKES ME SO ANGRY/SAD ON HER BEHALF. this is what her mouth looks like now



it's not THAT bad but i am worried that it will look a little... "trashy"? bear in mind that the adult teeth usually do not come in in that area until they are around 7. heck augustine is 6 1/2 and he has never lost a single tooth!

the good news is that she did great during the procedure. the nitrous gas was definitely the right way to go. we had augustine's first soccer game at 10:30 and olive's appointment at 11. so david took olive solo until i finished up the game and joined them. she was feeling really relaxed by the time i got there and i was just in time to see them yank the tooth out. which i watched. it was kind of interesting! once i knew she was in no pain i was fine seeing it but david said it felt too hard to see olive go through that. i mean how many times are you going to witness a tooth being pulled? i sang to her while it was going on and david held her hands. she seemed fine with it all THANK YOU JESUS. she got a little emotional once the gas was taken off and tearfully reached out to david to hold her.

im so glad that's over!