The Dental Recap

Last month at the dentist, it was determined that Micah needed both a cavity filled and a tooth extracted. That day was last Friday.

Being a busy household, I gave this date little thought until Thursday, at which time I promptly started freaking out. A lot. I mean, this is the kid who has gone to the dentist every 6 months for nearly 5 years and just last month for the very first time EVER he let the dentist not only look at his teeth (without trying to draw blood) but also let the dentist examine his teeth. Every single one of his teeth. Without protest. We were ever and ever so proud.

Cue the freak. I don't want my boy to regress to what he was, or worse. How on earth could I subject him to a filling and an extraction? GAAAAAHHHHHHH. (deep breaths, deep breaths)

We called other dentists to see what their strategy was for such things. We contemplated sedating him for the fun event. We debated letting nature run it's course since these were baby teeth we were talking about. (Okay, so that last one wasn't really an option, but at one small point it did cross my mind.)

Before I left for the appointment, I prayed. I prayed for Micah to be brave and cooperative. I prayed for myself to remain in control no matter what happened. And I prayed that the dentist wouldn't have to be physically tackled off my son. Because people, I was willing to go there if need be.

So here's how it went down.

I get to the dentist, we're shown to a room, and I ask if they use Valium.

"You mean for Micah, or for you?"

"Yes."

Micah is the best big boy ever and climbs up into the chair all by himself. He opens his mouth, the dentist takes a look-see, and next thing I know he's nearly finished with the filling. When he's holding the blue light on to seal the deal, Micah starts with a pitiful little tiny cry that is very much saying "I just want this to be done" rather than "I'm freaking out over here!"

And then I nearly cried. My boy sat through the filling of a cavity all by himself, just as big and brave as a grown man. Except he's not. He's a seven year old boy.

It was determined, though, that we'll do the extraction at another date. Even though he was better than the best that I could have imagined, none of us wanted to push him.

Could that boy make me any more proud if he tried?

(Why yes, there *is* a lack of photography at the end of the wordage. That would be Blogger's fault for limiting my photo storage space. Seriously? And they want me to spend money to buy more. I tried deleting photos on older posts to make room in storage, but it seemed to make little difference. This does not make me happy. I may or may not fix it. And I may or may not be dumping Blogger for anyone else that hosts blogs.)

4 comments:

My name is Sarah said...

Good boy Micah!!!!!!!!!

Burgh Baby said...

Every time you think you have it all figured out, BAM! Kids just enjoy torturing us with their unpredictability, I swear.

You don't have to upload pics to Blogger to use them with Blogger, you know. I never once uploaded a single one to Blogger...I use Photobucket and Flickr instead for photo hosting.

JennyH said...

WOW!! Yay for Micah!! I am so glad to hear he did awesome.

Brandie said...

Woohoo! He is really growing up.