Not with the teeth, baby
So Orion had a dentist's appointment yesterday morning. He needed to have a lot of work done, so they were planning to sedate him. This freaked my stuff out pretty well. Not that I don't trust his dentist, she's awesome. But O is just such a teeny-tiny skinny guy.
The sedation went perfectly fine. He didn't even really get that sleepy, just kind of laid-back and glassy-eyed. Kinda like me, most of the time. They put some sunglasses on him to protect his eyes from the glare of the lamp. They put a rubber nose-mask thingy with two hoses hanging off either side of it on him, for oxygen. He looked like a teeny-tiny John Travolta in Battlefield Earth. They pried is little mouth open with a variety of horrible plastic things, and commenced to work.
(Unfortunately, both Fenris and Orion seem to have weak dental enamel. I don't know why, I gobbled milk and calcium like crazy while I was pregnant with them. Could be because our water isn't flouridated. Could be because people on Daniel's side of the family have dental issues. I wish the boys had gotten my genes--I can bite through steel cans. Buy me enough tequila and I'll show you sometime.)
Anyway.
He was such a trooper. Not a single complaint. I think the process was harder on me that it was on him, stresswise anyway. I cringed with every whine of the drill, every teeny drop of blood on the bib. But he was fine. He got two toys, a sticker, and a sugar-free lolly for being such a good guy. Then, with many dire warnings about not biting his lips and cheek, because they were still numb, they sent us home.
About an hour later, O was having some pizza for lunch. All of a sudden, he clapped his hand to his mouth and started to cry. Now, he is one tough little nugget. I've seen him barely grumble over nasty scrapes and cuts. If he cries, it HURTS.
"What is it?" I asked him.
"My lip hurts! It hurts so much!"
"Let me take a look..."
Hurk.
Evidently, on the way home from the dentist, O had taken a chunk out of the inside of his lip. A BIG chunk. There was a piece of flesh missing, about half an inch wide and 1/8" deep. A HOLE. In my KID.
I bundled him up and took him back to the dentist. They clucked over him, and told me "you really have to watch these little guys so they don't do this." Cuz y'know, when I got home with him, I threw him in a closet and told him to be quiet so I could cook meth in the kitchen. I didn't let him out of my SIGHT once we got home. He must have done it in the car, and although I probably should have been staring at him the whole way home, I kinda thought that I should look at the road once in awhile.
So there wasn't much they could do for him. They took a picture of the wound, because it' was such a gnarly example of lip biting. It looked REALLY horrible blown up to 17" monitor size. Yet again, hurk. They got O some calcium-based creme that soothes wounds a bit and promotes healing. A two-ounce tube of it cost 50 bucks. But, of course, I wanted ANYTHING I could get to make him feel better.
The dentist told us that the inside of the mouth heals very quickly. The wound should be mostly closed over in a few days. Yay. Then she told me that it would almost certainly turn white and shed "matter" while it was healing.
Double hurk.
O had a very uncomfortable day. In between the motrin and the creme, I kept his pain under control, but he wasn't a very happy little man. He woke up a few times in the night needing an icepack and some TLC.
This morning, the hideous hole in his mouth seemed to have scabbed over. It was blackish-red, and the wound itself didn't hurt as much. However, he had some gnarly swelling in his lip. Looked like he'd been in a fight. So I iced it and gave him some motrin. Once the swelling went down, O declared he wanted to go to school--he didn't want to miss PE. (Yes, he actually is related to me. Hard to believe.) I took him to school. He couldn't WAIT to show off his grisly injury. I'm sure all his little-boy buddies will be delighted.
He has another dentist's appointment next Monday. Dog help us all.
Things I Have Learned From This Experience:
1. I never, ever want to see a big hole in my kid's face again.
2. When taking home a small child who's had extensive dental work, be sure to use a muzzle, cork, or ball gag to avoid auto-cannibalism. I'M KIDDING! Yeesh. But I may get him a gigantic sugarfree lolly next week. Maybe if he has THAT stuck in his mouth on the way home, he won't be able to do himself damage.
And they say life gets predictable when you have kids.