Four Year Old Adventure

This young lady had an adventure yesterday afternoon that I don’t think she’ll be forgetting any time too soon.

So each day my two youngest kids have “Quiet Time” and even though she’s four years old, Kaitlyn often sleeps still.  I attribute this to both the late hours as well as the early hours that her room-mates keep.  At any rate, the rule goes that sleep is a choice, but you must be quiet for an hour so the body can rest one way or the other.  Books are often read during this time and sometimes the dolls have an adventure or two.  These are quiet activities.  And Kaitlyn was tucked in with her “lovey”, Spooky, who often curls and cuddles right next to Kaitlyn and they both enjoy the snuggle time.

Yesterday I had put both children down in bed and had decided to enjoy a chapter or two in my own book while it was still quiet before tackling the laundry.  Dinner was already prepared so I was ahead of the game.  About 15 minutes into quiet time I heard a bump, which is often a book falling upstairs as someone drifts off to sleep or shifts in bed.  So that seemed like a completely normal sound.  Then I heard a door creak open, also a normal sound if the kitty has decided he needs to come down for a snack.  Then I heard the pitter patter of feet on a mission to find Mom.  I shut the book in anticipation and found Kaitlyn in tears running to me with her hand over her mouth crying “Mommy!  I did something!”  Seeing a little blood between the fingers I took her hand away from her mouth and sharply spoke “What did you do?  What did you do to yourself”.  The answer… “Nothing”!  I told her again sharply to lay down and open her mouth.  She hadn’t bled much so how bad could it be?  As soon as she opened her mouth I asked myself “How bad could THAT be”?  I saw her top front right tooth at an un-natural angle pointing toward the back of her mouth and hanging down quite a bit lower than its neighbors.  Yikes!  She said it hurt.  I could believe it.  I touched it and found that while of course it was loose it was still hanging on.  What to do!?!  Somewhere in the recesses of my mind I remembered a conversation with a health care professional I’d had somewhere along my parenting road and knew that the Pediatric Dentist my kids visit needed to be called and that he would be able to reset the tooth.  If he could do that then the body would reclaim the tooth and it would tighten back into place.  So I called and told his assistant what I was looking at.  She asked how soon I could be there.  Twenty minutes after putting the kids to bed we were flying out the door.  Half way to the dentist Kaitlyn admitted to falling out of the bed landing on her face as she tried to keep Spooky in bed next to her.  After an emergency X-Ray in a space chair with a smiley face lead apron it was determined that the adult tooth was not damaged, the blood supply to the area had not been severed, no antibiotics would be needed but yes, the tooth was dislocated from its socket having fractured the wafer-thin bone in that area.  Of course this had to be the day when we weren’t planning on going anywhere and Kaitlyn had dressed herself in a pink and white flower shirt, bright pink stretch pants with rainbow stripes, her favorite black Halloween socks with pumpkins all over them that she’d received in the mail from her only girl cousin and an old pair of sneakers from her older sister.  That aside, Kaitlyn bravely hopped up in the chair and just as she was opening her mouth and he was telling her what the tooth fairy had told him about her accident he grabbed hold of that tooth with a piece of gauze and popped it back into its socket!    Then he put pressure on the area to put the bone back together again.  A few tears and a blue popsicle later her tooth was back in its spot, although it will turn grey over the coming days, but after about 10 days it will be fully functional and holding space for her future adult tooth.  Lucky!  And it didn’t hurt anymore!  The Doctor gave me a knowing side look and said “Never a dull moment”.  No, I don’t have dull moments but if I did I think I would appreciate one or two of them.  We left for home, Kaitlyn sure that her tooth was missing now until she could see it in the mirror, and thankful that kids who normally need rides home from me were scheduled to run until 5 p.m. which was still an hour away.

As upset with her as I was I really couldn’t get too mad.  Rick and I compared notes about 17 years ago now and realized that our children would be doomed in the “Clutz” department.  And that has certainly held true for just about each and every one of them, with maybe one exception because she’s the only one who’s never visited the emergency room, with the exception of her birth where they got rid of me and wheeled me up onto the floor as fast as possible.  But that’s not the same.  The children got their “Clutz” factor from both sides, I admit.   As I drove home wishing I could put all my kids in a padded room with football helmets fastened to their skulls I wondered how it is possible that any one reaches adulthood in one piece.  The body’s resilience is an amazing and miraculous thing  and I’m grateful for that.  Yesterday we made it.  As I sit here typing today my 1 year old is climbing and scaling anything and everything he can find and one of my cats has found her way to the top of the entertainment center getting herself into a basket up near the ceiling.  I’m sure the next adventure is only a matter of time no matter what I say or do.  But for now, we’re OK.

It also occurs to me in all seriousness that every single time I went to Relief Society and left the kids with Rick I would come home to someone missing a tooth, ready… or not and mostly not!  Eventually I quit going!  Maybe… just maybe…  I should have taken more pity on him.