My brave little girl

Hannah had to have a tooth pulled out today and she did awesome.

Let me give you a little dental history on Hannah. She is a perfect cautionary tale to parents on why you should never let your child fall asleep with a bottle of milk every night.

I believe it was the summer after kindergarten (or maybe first grade) that it was discovered that Hannah had 6 cavities. Yes, SIX!!! That is too many to fix in one setting and the dentist said they would only do one quadrant of her mouth at a time. Hannah and I headed in to her regular dentist's office for the first visit and Hannah flipped out. Novocaine just wasn't going to cut it with her. No needles. No being awake. It just wasn't happening.

The dentist referred us to a "kiddie" dentist that uses laughing gas. This of course required a consultation with the new dentist before we could even start the procedures. I'm telling you this so that you can count up how many dentist visits we had over the course of the summer. You'll need more than one hand but I don't think you'll quite get to using your toes.

But I digress....

After the consultation Hannah and I headed back the next Friday to do her first quadrant. They gave her the laughing gas and everything seemed to be going fine until they actually started working in her mouth and the first dental power tool fired up. The noise FREAKED her out and she started thrashing around and screaming and crying. Eventually the laughing gas wore off and they couldn't do anything for her that day. While consulting with the dentist I was told we would try it again the next Friday, and that they could fix the cavity while she was screaming and crying but they couldn't do it if she thrashed around so the next week they would have a "papoose board" ready. What is that you ask? It's a board with straps that would wrap her up like a papoose and strap her down while they worked on her. Now keep in mind, even if I could stomach watching that once in order to get the job done we would have to subject her - and me! - to that horror THREE more times. (Remember, quadrants...)

Instead I came up with the idea of letting her borrow Daddy's iPod. At the time she was really into the Dixie Chicks so we grabbed his iPod, made sure the Dixie Chicks were on there, and snagged a pair of our noise-cancelling headphones. While the dentist worked on her teeth Hannah had the laughing gas to keep her relaxed and the iPod and headphones to block out the noise. It worked like a charm. The only problem we had each week was her crying and freaking out in the parking lot afterwards as the Novocaine wore off and she had to deal with that tingly sensation that everyone hates.

So every Friday for what seemed like the entire summer Hannah and I headed to the dentist. For those of you that have lost track that is one regular dentist visit, one failed Novocaine attempt, one consultation, one failed laughing gas attempt, and then one visit per quadrant for a total of EIGHT delightful dental visits that summer.

A month or so ago Hannah went for her dental cleaning and was told that she had a baby tooth that wasn't falling out but had an infection in the gums above it. It wasn't really bothering her and it wasn't anything to worry about but the dentist said if it didn't fall out on its own she'd suggest taking it out before it became an issue. Since it didn't fall out on its own I scheduled her to have it removed this morning.

When the dentist told Hannah she might have to have a tooth pulled Hannah started crying. I'm sure she had horrible flashback so the Dental Summer from Hell so I don't blame her. I felt a little sorry for myself too since I didn't really want to experience the torture again either. I didn't tell her when I made the appointment and I sort of hoped she'd forget about it until this morning. The tooth started to loosen up on its own and I know she was doing her best to try and make it fall out but it just wasn't going to happen. In the meantime her gums above it were getting more and more sore.

She didn't sleep well last night but this morning she got ready for her day without much fuss. When we got in the car, however, she said in the smallest little voice "I'm scared Mommy." I told her it was nothing to worry about and that she'd be getting the laughing gas again. I cracked a bunch of jokes and had her laughing by the time we got there but I knew she was still worried. She sat beside me while I filled out all the paperwork and waited patiently for her turn to be called. When they called her name and we stood up to go in she threw her arms around me and hugged me as we walked but still didn't utter a single complaint. I once again got her laughing when we went into the office. We had been referred to a different oral surgeon this time and it turns out that instead of the laughing gas they were going to knock her out completely. This was fine with me, although it made me a little nervous, but I knew it would be easier on her.

The scary part was when they started hooking her up to all the wires. They carefully monitor the patients while they're out and so they had a blood pressure cuff on her arm, a blood oxygen monitor on her finger, and three electrodes on the inside of each wrist and on one ankle. She looked up at me with a brief look of panic when they started strapping her into everything but I could tell she was doing her best to be brave. She asked for the iPod and headphones, which luckily I had remembered to bring, and she listened to iCarly while they put her out. The dentist had me leave the room for the procedure but the whole thing took less than 10 minutes and then she was in the recovery area.

Do you know what was the greatest part about this whole thing this time around? It was how proud she was of herself. When I walked into the recovery area she was beaming from ear to ear, with bloody gauze hanging out of her mouth, and said, "Mommy, I did it! I did it!"

I am so proud of her.