Our trip to the dentist

So, today I had to take Little Boy to the pediatric dentist. He has 4 cavities that needed fillings. We got there and the assistant worked for at least 15 minutes to get the little bite films into his mouth. He kept panicking - he finally told us he thought she was going to push them too far into his mouth and he didn't want to barf. We got him to calm down and got the x-rays done.

Then the dentist came in, and she told me he had a deep cavity on one side, another large cavity on the other side, and two smaller cavities. She did not want to fill the deep cavity, especially, because the tooth would just end up getting abscessed. So she recommended doing a pulpotomy - basically a root canal. Because he was so difficult getting x-rays, she wants to do this under general anesthesia. The soonest we can get through the insurance red tape and get in is December 4th. He has to get an exam to make sure he's ok for going under. While we were talking, she gave some model teeth to Little Boy to look at. One tooth had a silver crown.

On our way home we were talking. He wanted to know why the dentist didn't fill his cavities. I told him we need to go to another "office", the dentist will have him drink something that will make him a little sleepy, and when he wakes up, his teeth will be all fixed. He seemed fine with that. But when I told him he'd have two teeth that were silver, he got upset. "Someone might think I'm a different kid." I told him that the teeth are so far in the back that no one would even know unless he opened his mouth really wide and tipped his head. And that no one would think he was a different kid. (I don't know why that is important, but it comes up fairly often.)

We also need to watch for infections. I just wish we could get this done earlier.