First Ever Dental Visit is Yay!

Suzanne’s Post reminded me that I needed to post this.

We took Niko to the dentist last week for his first ever dental check up.

I was in a state of higher than usual anxiety about this for a number of reasons ranging from guilt that we hadn’t done it earlier (ADA recommends starting at 12 months) and fear that he had cavities (my poor baby!) to near-crippling emotional fallout from simply terrible, traumatic dental experiences that I’ve had throughout my life. FOR INSTANCE, and if you’re the kind of person who is scared of dentists, look away now, FOR INSTANCE, I remember my very first dental appointment! I was five or so. My dad took me. The dentist took me into his office (like, this desk-and-paperwork office) while my dad waited outside, and he sat behind his desk and I sat in a hard wooden chair, and he had a long lecture-y talk with me about What He Would Do To Me if I misbehaved in the exam chair. This included a threat to handcuff me to the chair. Ha haaaaa! FUN, right? And totally appropriate! I’m sure it comes as no surprise what so ever that after this experience I got the screaming fits when confronted with him and had to go to a special pricey pediatric dentist afterward. Yay. That dude was good. The dude after him? DID NOT KNOW HOW TO ADMINISTER NOVOCAINE to the point where I’d just get fillings with no Novocaine because why bother shit don’t work. HAAAAAAAAAAAH.

So anyway!

I don’t have a dentist currently. A quick googling showed a pediatric dentist literally 3 blocks from our home, easily walkable, who takes our insurance. I put off calling and put off calling and put off calling, and then finally called, trying not to hyperventilate. Making the appointment was easy! I even managed to sleep the night before! Nesko and I walked Niko over there. I tried to prep him by telling him what-to-expect stories involving various characters and imaginary friends going to the dentist. Once there, I filled out paperwork while Nesko took Niko into the play room with a climbing structure, slide, and tunnels. WHAT. WHAT.

After a very short wait, we were called back. The dental assistant counted Niko’s teeth, showed him the various tools, brushed his teeth, and took X-Rays. I had a nasty moment where it looked on the X-Ray like he had an immense crack through one of his teeth, but the dentist came in and looked everything over and said he looked fine so it must have just been a shadow or something OH THANK GOOD. There was no flossing, no tooth scraping, just a listerine-and-water rinse and a fluoride application. I asked about sealing his teeth and will bring it up when he gets his adult teeth in. The assistant and dentist were both really cool, laid back, patient, and kind.

Niko was totally unbothered by the events. They had TVs on the wall, so he watched Elmo, and at the end he got two big stickers and a sugar-free sucker. Little dude would shiv me IN A HEART BEAT for a sucker, so this was basically bliss for him. We walked back home and had a chill day.

I’m really glad that his first dental experience, like all of his medical experiences so far, has been so… non-dramatic. I wish we’d taken him to the dentist earlier, but there doesn’t seem to have been any harm done in waiting. We’ll take him again in six months, as recommended by the ADA.

And now that he’s been, I’ve got the first piece of paperwork finished that I need… to enroll him in school this fall. DUN… DUN… DUNNNNNNN.

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