Tooth Trouble

Riley's front tooth is just dangling, waiting for a good yank for it to be gone, and he refuses to let anybody pull it. Last night while I was at volleyball, Ken convinced him to run some dental floss around the tooth so that he could just yank the floss to extract it. Riley worked the floss under and around his tooth, but then refused to pull it.

When I arrived home, Riley was walking around with six inches of dental floss hanging out of his mouth. Ken explained what was going on, and it was all I could do not to just yank it out while Riley was yapping. Finally, I told Riley to get the floss out of his mouth and go to bed. Oops, one problem, the floss was stuck. It seriously was not coming out.

We tried everything short of just yanking out the floss and the tooth, but the floss refused to budge. I told Riley there was no other option but to just rip the whole mess out of his mouth, but he refused. He had a solution, and after about a minute, he had trimmed the floss down to about 1/2 an inch with a pair of scissors. Nice.

I grabbed some Oragel to numb his tooth, and then persuaded him to let me have a go at tooth removal. I don't like pulling teeth, by the way. Riley made me do three applications of Oragel before he felt he was sufficiently numb, and then gave me the go-ahead to yank out the tooth. Wouldn't you know, that bugger just refused to come out even though it's hanging out at a 45 degree angle?

Then I threw Riley an apple and told him to eat it and the tooth still held out. Nothing was working. Finally I sent him to bed, and this morning I sent Riley off to school with the dental floss and tooth dangling from his gums, along with one simple instruction. "When you're playing with your friends at recess today, encourage one of the stronger ones to punch you in the mouth. Then we don't have to worry about that tooth anymore." (It worked the last time his brother got him good in the kisser...)

Besides, didn't I mention that I really hate having to pull teeth?

Another Tooth!

Shannon and Riley came running downstairs screaming and just about scared me to death! Once I heard what they were saying, I understood the excitement. Shannon had lost his second tooth! When I asked him how it fell out, Shannon said casually, "Well, I was jumping on the bed and I slammed my face!"

Yippie, the count is two lost teeth each for Riley and Shannon!

Weekend, Update

With a yard like this, you'd think my kids played football:

(Look closely, you'll see yard-lines. Ken + fertilizer = stripes.)

Well, we're not doing football yet, but we do have a T-Ball player (and Assistant Coach) in the family. Shannon is playing for another year only because his buddy Sean is playing and Sean's Dad, Jesse, is the coach. Jesse, in turn, named Ken his assistant. Here they are at the opening ceremony:

And here is Shannon ready for his first game of the season (minus one shoe):

It should be an interesting year. There was a lot of craziness getting the league going this year, but now all we have left are two months of T-Ball games. Most are on Friday nights so we will still have our weekends free, and since Ken's presence is mandatory, I'm not forced to be at every game whether I want to be there or not.

--------------------------

Onto another subject, Riley has been bothered by allergies this Spring and has been experiencing a lot of drainage. I let him sleep in the recliner one night, which enabled him to get a decent nights sleep. However, when I demanded he sleep in his own bed the next night, he improvised:

Riley made his own recliner by dumping out a large tub of clothes that he'd found in his closet, and filling the tub with a large stack of clean blankets which were also found in his closet. Now I have two large piles of once organized, folded, and clean laundry that is now disorganized, wrinkly and most likely not-so-clean. But Riley is sleeping well at night.

-------------------------------

And finally, I spent all morning at a dentist's office getting a second opinion about having veneers placed on my teeth. The good news is that they ARE an option. The bad news is that I would have to go through hell before my teeth could accept them. Seems I have an overbite that would result in failure within ten years if I went ahead and got them now.

The solution is simple. First of all, I would need to get braces (luckily it appears that I would only have to wear them for 12 - 18 months.) In order to prepare my teeth for braces, I would need to have five root canals and three fillings done. Once this has been accomplished, I can wear braces for under two years at an approximate cost of $5400. Once my bite has been corrected and my teeth aligned, I would have to have three crowns put on my molars, and then if I would still like to correct the yellow tooth (which will now be straight,) I have a little more work left. Should my yellow tooth survive all of the shifting from the braces, I would then have to have a root canal performed on it, (although if the tooth fails at either of these two stages, I can always get an implant, no problem.) Once the root canal is performed, they can shave it down and apply a veneer. Simple as that!

Did I mention that I don't mind the spaces in my teeth, I simply want to repair the one yellow tooth? Anyhow, we're talking about it, but in the meantime, I'm going to hit a couple of grocery stores and get some quotes on teeth-whitening products.

Dentists, Diets and Dirt

I went to the dentist today for a cleaning and came away with great news! (That never happens, I have sensitive teeth and I have grown to hate my dental appointments.) First, I had two pieces of filling material jammed in between my teeth and with much effort they were dislodged and removed. I can floss again! Secondly, veneers are an affordable option for my front teeth now, and Ken said "Let's do it!"

For those of you who may not know, I have a lovely yellow front tooth that is dead due to a diving accident I had when I was younger. (You know those '3 Feet - No Diving' signs you see at the swim pools? Well, I wish the teenager at Arnold Heights Swim Pool in 1981 had seen them, maybe then she wouldn't have decided to dive directly on my head!) Another result of this accident (or possibly just a genetic defect?) was a spacious gap between my two front teeth. My brother Casey says it's reminiscent of Madonna, therefore oddly attractive. (Gotta love Casey.) My take on it, however, is that if I can fix it without losing the tooth, I'm gonna do it!

----------

We're doing yet another nutrition study on Corey, it seems that a five year old should weigh more than 30 pounds. Hmmm.... yeah, I suppose so. The doctor also wants to run some tests to see if he has any allergies, deficiencies or disorders that might be attributed to his small stature. It seems like we'll never figure it out completely, but I'd put my money on Corey's birth weight (he was 1 pound 9 ounces) being a direct cause of it. Or perhaps the fact that he has Cerebal Palsy, which causes him to burn calories at an accelerated rate, could play into his slow growth. Or maybe Corey's size was meant to be, his paternal Grandmother is amazingly little and short. (Sorry, Joanne!)

----------

One more tangent. Riley and I planted some seeds yesterday, and we're hoping they take off. We had seed packets of mums and bachelor buttons, and I had cuttings from last year's black-eyed susans, mums, and some unknown flower the neighbor planted. Riley was wanting to plant carrots, so today I scooped up a packet of carrots and onions as well. We'll be starting three flats in all (recycled from my seedling purchases last spring,) with 48 plants per flat. Not sure what will happen if they all take off, however, because I honestly have no place to put them! I suppose I'll share the wealth with all of my neighbors if it comes to that.