The Tooth, The Whole Tooth and Nothing but the Tooth

April 22nd started like any other morning at our house.  We all got up and got ready to start the day.  Scott left for work and Carter and I were heading out the door not far behind him.  As with most forward motion lately, Carter was running.  He tried to stop, tripped and came down on a glass change container we have. 

He instantly started screaming, which was my first sign something was wrong.  He rarely cries when he falls. Then, when I picked him up, he was gushing blood out of his mouth.  I called Scott, since it was still before school started, and we discussed what to do.  Upon initial inspection, I thought he had chipped his tooth.  I called the doctor's office after hours service and the doctor said going to the emergency room would be a waste and we really needed to see a dentist.  There was nothing the doctor's office could do.  Not especially reassuring but glad to know before we possibly attempted the ER.

Since Carter had yet to go to a regular dentist and emergency dentistry is hard to come by, it had to wait until I could figure out what we could do.  I cleaned him up as much as possible, calmed him down and we headed to Dessa's house. 

Thankfully, I found a dentist we could see that afternoon and Carter did GREAT!  He let the dentist look at his teeth and brush them too.  He determined that Carter had actually shoved the tooth back up in to his gums.  OUCH!  Carter seemed to be doing okay and the dentist said we just need to wait and see.

Needless to say, Carter looked a little funky afterward, but it didn't seem to bother him.  He was quickly running through the house again.  Thinking back, we are so lucky the jar didn't break.  His tooth being jammed back in to his gums was bad, but glass breaking in his face could have been much worse.  And, since I am constantly late posting things on the  blog, and I am posting this two months after it happened, I can now say his tooth has come back down and is almost back down to its original spot.  So crazy.

Our little hillbilly.  Don't mind the blood on his face.  His mouth would bleed on and off after the incident.

 

He was thrilled after going to the dentist, because the dentist gave him a ball for being so good.  The ball lasted all of about an hour before Eddie got it and popped it.

 

The dentist office was great.  It had a playroom to sit in before going back with movies, toys and video games.  And, the dentist and staff were very friendly.  It was a great find and close to the house.  Guess we found Carter's long term dentist.  We just didn't think we would be doing it yet.