Learning Experience

As a mother, I clearly have a lot to learn. Today I learned something which would be useful to share with all of you with children in your lives. Please feel free to learn from my experience!

Sarah and I were driving to the orthodontist. She needed to have her retainer adjusted because a loose tooth had been twisting and was pushing against the retainer in a painful way. This tooth has been quite stubborn about coming out in a timely way, and we're being as patient and encouraging as possible. Anyway, as we're driving to the orthodontist, we're talking about the retainer adjustment and how her teeth are doing. She expresses concern about her tooth and wonders what the orthodontist will do. Feeling confident that this adjustment will greatly improve the fit of her retainer, I reassure her and finish with a joke about how he'll probably just pull out the troublesome tooth! Ha ha... Well, for some reason this added to her anxiety, but I somehow persuaded her to go into the friendly orthodontist office.

They all welcome us and invite us to sit while they look at her mouth and her retainer. Hmm... What to do... They look again and then they propose the best solution would be to pull the bothersome tooth out! Oh no! Sarah's eyes grew much too large for her face as she looked to me for comfort. Unfortunately, my eyes had also grown much too large for my face!

We held hands, said a quick prayer, and braced ourselves for what turned out to be a quick pull but with a bit of bleeding. They stuck some cotton in her mouth to stop the bleeding and gave us a coupon for Dairy Queen to help her recover. So the apologies began as I drove from the office to Dairy Queen, and will probably continue for awhile.

Now I'm sure it is clear to all of you that she will never trust me again as we drive to a doctor appointment. Would you? Perhaps it is not the best idea to joke around about pulling teeth, shots or surgeries. Just make a note for future reference!