Maggie had her teeth cleaned Tuesday and the doc saw a need for 2 more fillings. She had them done this morning and it was HORRIBLE! I felt so bad for her. She didn't like the nitrous oxide gas mask they put on her and kept trying to take it off. And the dentist was fairly irritating. This was a pediatric dentist, which our insurance doesn't cover. We tried to get an appointment with her regular dentist, but after her last cleaning, when she wouldn't let them finish because the cold water spritzer hurt her teeth, they won't let her come back until she is older. I was so mad! They kicked us out! She did fine there the previous 4 times and now the receptionist won't let us schedule an appointment. Our dental insurance is lousy. It won't let us change dentists except once a year, which will be January for Maggie. So Maggie is basically without a regular dentist until then. In the mean time we have to pay for the one we used today. Grrrrr.....
On top of that, Maggie has not lost any baby teeth yet, but her adult teeth are coming in right behind the baby teeth. It looks kind of like shark teeth. The dentist said he would have to pull the baby teeth out at the end of the summer if they don't fall out. Waaaaahhhhh! Is this necessary so soon? Can we let them hang out a little longer? I've been trying to get Maggie to wiggle her teeth so those baby ones will fall out, but they just aren't loose. So more dentistry may be in our future.
Oh, and did I mention she has 7 more "spots to watch" on her teeth which may become in need of fillings? Why is this happening? The dentist said I need to have her "cut back on the sodas". I looked at him dumbly and said she has never drank a soda in her life. And I cut her juice consumption down to almost nothing last year when we first learned Maggie was having tooth problems. We are brushing like mad, use a brush on flouride gel (the $27 toothpaste). What else can we do?
7 years ago
2 comments:
I have no idea if there is any truth to this or not however I think there is a connection between milk and flouride. When my two oldest girls were young they had incredible teeth issues. They drank a ton of milk and I brushed their teeth all the time.
When the dentist prescribed flouride I also started that. I noticed the problems continued. I read a warning on the prescription; wait 4 hours minimum after using the flouride before having milk. With my girls it wasn't an option. We would wait as long as possible.
My third daughter came along. She too drinks a ton of milk. I don't brush her teeth as often and stay away from the flouride tablets. No problems at ALL! Just a thought.
You may want to check the research before you go through pulling teeth. My 7 year old daughter has had at least 4 of her 8 teeth double before falling out. We have an amazing dentist (filled my 3 year old's teeth with amazing skill, speed and dexterity when the dental school dentists had said they would have to be pulled....I am forever grateful to him for saving my son from general anesthesia and pulled teeth) who reassured me about my daughter's teeth. He said in the past they used to pull baby teeth that didn't fall out when the adults grew in because they thought the baby ones would keep the permanent ones from growing in the right way, but that studies show that it is just not so. That if you look at kids long term, while the pulled group's teeth might align sooner, by the time kids are 8 or 9 years old, pulled and non-pulled kids' mouths look the same---the teeth will eventually fall out and realign on their own. If you let them fall out naturally you save the child the pain/trauma of the extraction (and you the expense) and it does no harm. You just have to be sure they brush well to get between the two sets. So they have "shark teeth" for a while....it's a small price to pay to avoid having teeth ripped out of your mouth needlessly. My daughter's teeth have aligned beautifully and I am so glad we left them alone.
LW
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