A trip to the dentist

With the boys, first dentist visits happened around eighteen months.  With Iz, though, I had so much trouble finding a dentist who would see her!  They hear "heart defect" and "open heart surgery" and they couldn't see her until she was five.  I wasn't too worried--until her front teeth started to discolor after several hard falls during some seizures.  I finally found a dentist a few months ago willing to see her.....and she was promptly fired as a patient after a very short first visit.  She was very anxious, would not sit in the chair, would not let them get a good look in her mouth.  Based on the quick look the dentist did get and my description of what happened and the timeline of the graying of her teeth, they advised I get her into a pediatric dentist who could possibly sedate her because she was probably going to need baby root canals to save the teeth to ensure her permanent teeth came in properly down the road.

Finding a pediatric dentist in my area that accepted our insurance was not easy.  But I finally found one and while we had to wait about a month to get an appointment, we went in today.  Iz was still anxious and not very cooperative but the dentist had several techs come in and between them and myself we held her arms and legs and head still so he could get a look.  She wasn't happy but she did get a very good exam and her teeth look great, even the damaged ones!  Much of the discoloration is actually now gone and they are returning to their normal color, they are not loose at all, there's no swelling in the gums above the teeth, and while he wants me to continue to keep a close eye on them, he believes she will be just fine.  Apparently you can bruise the tissue inside teeth--sometimes the blood that clots in there does kill off the tooth but if the circulation is good enough, it breaks up the clot and the discoloration goes away and the tooth is fine.  Looks like she just had some bruising and hopefully when we have her followup, the coloration on those teeth will be absolutely normal and that will be the end of it :p  Now that she is on a good dose of her seizure meds, she rarely has injury-inducing falls.  She falls, of course, she's only three, but when she used to fall due to seizures, she wouldn't put her hands out to break her fall and that's why she kept hitting her teeth.  Now, those hands come out and she sometimes gets a scrape or bump on her hands but that is way better than busting up her face :p

Tomorrow, we head up to the hospital for our new patient visit with the ophthalmologist (the one we've been seeing the past few years moved to California).  She is excited because she likes getting her eyes checked plus she packed up her snacks and things and can't wait to use the "lunch purse" we won from Mom on the Go's contest around Christmastime :p  S thought the lunch bag was a cool purse so they all call it the "lunch purse" now LOL