That's our little monster. Let me tell you what a trooper she is.
See those teeth? More specifically, those spots on her teeth? That's some pretty advanced decay. The top teeth were even worse. We realized how badly she needed dental care while I was unemployed and we were on Wisconsin's Badger Care. Which seems really cool. We couldn't afford to get our child the health care she needed, so the state would pick it up for us. Except that we couldn't find a dentist that would take patients on Badger Care.
Mostly her teeth didn't bother her. Sometimes while eating she favored one side. Mostly it seemed like something that could wait until I found a job and got insurance. Which I did. Then found out that most dentists wouldn't accept you as a patient if you had been on Badger Care in the last year. Some would accept a quota of patients per month, though, so we got on a waiting list with a clinic that had filled its quota for that month and the next, but would eventually have openings.
Sometime around September her teeth really started hurting. Like whimper herself to sleep at night they hurt so bad. That was pretty distressing to have your sweet little girl in such pain, nothing you could do about it and the people who could do something about it telling you they wouldn't because you were too poor too recently to be worth their time.
Well, we were able to convince the clinic where we were on a waiting list that this seemed like an emergency to us, so they let us bring her in. A dentist looked at Tabby's teeth and told us, "Sure enough, that looks pretty bad. You need to take her to a pediatric dentist."
Fortunately, the pain Tabby had been experiencing was just a flare up of some sort. Within a couple of days she was back to just sometimes favoring one side when she chewed, wincing when we brushed, but mostly okay. We got an appointment for nearly a month later with a pediatric dentist. She got a list of work that needed doing, told us that because Tabby was only four, it would have to be done under sedation, in a hospital and there were no openings any time in the near future. She'd let us know.
Back to mostly only occasional pain while we waited. Mid December we were finally told that an appointment had been made for Tabby on January 13th to have the work done. Only a month to go. We began preparing Tabby right away for the day of her hospital stay. No food that morning. Just apple juice for breakfast, go play at a friends for a little bit then to the hospital. By the time the day arrived, she knew exactly how the routine would go.
She went in at 11:00 am. It was supposed to be pretty quick. We didn't think I'd need to take any time off work. Becky would probably be home with Tabby about the time the boys got back from school then I'd be home soon after that. But I wanted to be home when they arrived, so I took the afternoon off anyway.
Turns out to be a good thing I did. Tabby had some difficulty coming off the anesthetic. Every time they took her off oxygen some number they monitor dropped really low and she turned blue. Didn't want to wake up. Becky let me know what was up. I went to the store got a bunch of soft foods for Tabby. Applesauce, yogurt, popsicles, sherbet. Got my poor little girl some flowers. Took Sam to a friends house. About 5ish, Becky said Tabby was still fine as long as she had oxygen, and she seemed to remember that someone in my family reacted similarly, could I call my Mom to find out what it was? Could I order some pizza for the boys and come to the hospital so she could go get some food?
It was my Mom who reacted like Tabby. Almost exactly the same, I guess. I don't know if it helped them to know that at the hospital, but by the time I got there Tabby was off oxygen, but not quite awake. It was nice to see she didn't need the mask, but still tough to have my little girl there with her mouth all swollen, an IV in her hand, hooked up to a monitor. It wasn't too long ago that I had my root canal. My mouth had been pretty sore, and here was my poor Tabby who just went through so much more work than I'd had done.
I talked to her a little bit, she woke up. Maybe it was because they were taking her blood pressure and she felt the armband, or maybe it was just time. I like to think she heard her Daddy there and woke up for me. She rested a little more while Becky went to the cafeteria and got some hamburgers for herself and me. Tabby got a whole tray full of soft foods to choose from, yogurt, mashed potatos, jello. She took a couple bites of yogurt and potato, looked at my hamburger and said, "That looks really good."
"Would you like a bite of my hamburger, Tabby?"
"Yeah."
The first bite was voraciously huge. The next couple, a little smaller, a little gentler. She decided to try the chocolate pudding. She ate a lot of chocolate pudding.
The doctors wanted to keep Tabby around a bit to make sure her oxygen level stayed steady. No one argued. Becky went home about 7ish. At nearly 8:00 pm Tabby said, "I'm really tired. I think it's bed time." It had been a long day. About an hour later they finally let us go.
Tabby was so glad to get home. She loved her flowers. That's about all she noticed. We let her sleep with us.
The next morning I asked her which of all the soft foods she wanted. Yogurt? A boiled egg? Some toast? She looked at the Pizza Hut box in our fridge, "Some pizza would be good." Turns out Tabby wasn't interested in a gentle recovery. Her mouth was a little sore, but she was up and happy and glad to have it done with.
Sunday morning I asked how her mouth felt. "Oh so very good," she sighed. I almost started crying I was so happy.
Sunday morning we also got a visit from the tooth fairy who left Tabby some blueberries for the tooth the doctors took out. Why blueberries? Tabby got a book for Christmas.
I guess if blueberries are good enough for a bear, then that's what Tabby wanted too. We tried telling her that kids usually got money from the tooth fairy, but Tabby insisted the tooth fairy would bring her blueberries. I guess Tabby was right.
