Monday, January 30, 2012

Chipped Tooth

Friday, on my way home from work, Matt calls me to tell me that Nicole has chipped her front tooth. Ugh! Apparently, Nicole was chewing on a fork, like she often does, though we are constantly telling her not to, and she tried to shove the fork between her two front teeth and she chipped off a bit of her front tooth.






It bled for a little bit and she wailed, but then the bleeding and the wailing stopped and she was doing okay. I called around to dentists Friday at 4pm, but I guess a lot of dentists get out early on Fridays because... they can. And, a lot of dentists won't even work on a 2 year old, so I was specifically limited to pediatric dentists. In the end, I was unable to get Nicole into a dentist on Friday. She will go into the dentist this morning.

I was able to talk directly with a dentist though (one who would not work on her because of her age) who said that most likely they will either file the tooth to even out the break or fill it, but there is a chance that the filling will fall out if she continues to chew on hard things (which it seems likely she will do).

All weekend long, she kept trying to chew on things. Toys, more forks (we had to switch her back to plastic baby forks), books, just whatever. What is the deal? Why do kids want to put things in their mouth? It is gross! Not to mention painful if you chip a tooth because of it. Also, I fight her to eat the yummy meals that I prepare for her, but she is more than willing to taste a library book.

UPDATE: Went to the dentist and Nicole had a cavity in her front tooth that caused decay and weakened the tooth. So, when she put the pressure of the fork on the tooth, it was very easy for it to break.

While at the dentist, we thought he should probably look at her other teeth and sure enough, Nicole has two cavities in her back bottom molars. Yes, Nicole has her Daddy's teeth. I have had exactly one cavity ever and it was on a baby tooth that fell out. Since then, I have been cavity free. Matt on the other hand... he went to the dentist last week and it was the first time... ever that he didn't have a cavity in one of his teeth. Bad enamel.

So, Nicole needs fillings on her back teeth and they will fill her front tooth. But, we couldn't do it today because Nicole just couldn't sit still in the chair. She was nervous and didn't like sitting in the chair and really didn't want to lay down in the chair, so the dentist prescribed her some Valium and she will go back in tomorrow morning all doped up to get her fillings. It will be a far less traumatic experience if she is calm. But, the dentist said that 20% of kids are still very wiggly even with the medication and the NOS, so we shall see how she does.

Nicole did get her very first cleaning today and though she was very wiggly and very nervous, I thought she did very well. No tears! Which is a win in my book.

More updates tomorrow and pictures with her new fixed teeth.

5 comments:

Sarah said...

That Nicoley-o, always getting into some sort of mishief. you'd think kids would learn their lesson, right?

Jasmine said...

Alexis chipped her front tooth by falling off a chair when she was 10 months old. It's still chipped. Basically, the dentist said that her tooth wasn't necessarily in trouble, and they won't usually do any work on baby teeth unless the child is in pain or it could become dangerous. So my prediction is that the dentist will just file it down and recommend you don't let her chew on forks anymore. (Yeah right, huh.)

Good luck!

Marie said...

She won't eat food, but she'll eat forks. My friend's 4 year old recently went to the dentist to get 5 cavities filled and they had to put him under to do it.

Samuel said...

Ah, well, kids will be kids. The chipped tooth doesn't sound good, but look on the bright side: it opened an opportunity to get those cavities detected and fixed, and it's great that she handled the procedure well.

As for the chewing habit, it may just be a phase, but it can pay to remind her once in a while not to do that anymore.
-Samuel Hershey

Unknown said...

A chipped tooth doesn’t really sound good Samuel, but with Nicole’s case, her parents shouldn’t worry a lot about it since it was just a baby tooth. A permanent tooth will replace it soon after. It’s a good thing though that they were also made aware of her other tooth problems when they visited the dentist.

Landen Worley