Friday, July 3, 2009

Toothless

It all started with Hollie getting a cold - coughing, stuffy nose, etc. So, we took her in to the doctor & they thought it might be swine flu. Joyous. Thankfully they ran the tests & it came back negative (whew!). Just an ear infection/cold that can easily be remedied by antibiotics. Not too bad. Well, at 10:00 pm last night we were trying to administer her medicine (which is not pleasant - wailing & gnashing of teeth are involved). As Sam sat her on our solid surface countertop, she lunged to get away & her face hit the top of the counter. Screaming ensued & I thought it was just a bumped lip or something. Oh, if only. Half of her top right tooth is now lost to the unknown abyss. We looked, but couldn't ever find it. And of course this happened late at night, and at the beginning of a holiday weekend when almost all dentists are closed. For the love.

So, we of course called our family dentist (who's in California), who referred us to someone, who referred us to someone else. I was not having much luck. In the end, Sam was inspired to tell the whole ordeal to a random co-worker this morning. Miraculously, her three-year-old had done the same thing & they had an amazing dentist fix it. So, I called Mr. Amazing Dentist & they were not only open but could see her first thing this morning.

I knew the exam was not going to go particularly smoothly as Hollie has a somewhat difficult time sitting still. It actually wasn't too bad, although Sam & I had to pin her body down while Mr. Amazing Dentist (who's real name is Dr. Quayle) held her head. He was actually impressed. He said, "She's surprisingly strong for her petite little frame." Tell me about it.

Anyway, Dr. Quayle determined that the chip only went into the 2nd layer of the tooth & there isn't any nerve damage. Yeah! Which means that he can just fill in the missing piece without removing the whole tooth or putting in a crown. The bad news is Dr. Quayle is out of town until the 13th of July. We're leaving for Snowbird tomorrow, so Hollie gets to be the toothless wonder for the whole trip. At least it will be memorable.

As you can imagine, it has been a long couple of days. We are so grateful, though, and know that Heavenly Father was watching over us. It really could have been so much worse. The doctor even said after he works his magic you'll barely be able to tell that anything happened. All I can say is that it's a good thing we have a week of vacation coming up. All three of us desperately need it.