Mr. T goes to the dentist

Apparently our kids hit the genetic lottery when it comes to teeth.  So far we have a child with an undersized and perpendicular tooth, and another with a missing adult tooth, a perpendicular tooth, and not enough room in his little mouth for all those big teeth coming in.  As you know, Zach was fitted with braces last week.  This week, in preparation for a semi-permanent space-maintaining device, our dentist had to pull four of Tyler's teeth. Poor kid!

Here's his pre-pull smile, with all baby teeth intact.  He did lose a bottom tooth just the night before.

Tyler first received a topical anesthetic (the sticks in his mouth), which didn't really work, and then a series of painful shots to numb him up before the procedure.  I didn't prepare him enough for that (in my defense, the staff was misleading about how much he would feel), and he was really hurting. Afterwards, with a total of five large gaps in his mouth, he chewed on some gauze to absorb the blood.  I'll spare you the internal photo Garry took.  It's gross.

Tyler was very, very brave during his appointment and has been mostly pain-free since the initial post-pull wave of pain came and went.  He has some trouble eating and has a slight lisp.  He's anxious for his adult teeth to fill in the gaps of his jack-o-lantern smile.

In other news, Tyler has been a reading maniac this summer. He has finished seven teen fiction novels, with at least one more to go before school starts.  He finished the library's summer reading program last month, but was disappointed to learn that the only t-shirts available are adult mediums, which drown  him.  He is still proud of his accomplishments. I'm so glad he is getting lost in the joy of reading.