by Esther C. Baird, first published in the Ipswich Local News, January 25, 2023
I’ve written a lot about teeth over the years. Regular readers will recall the girl’s first tooth losses … and then the second through one billionth losses when the Tooth Fairy didn’t quite live up to expectations, (the expectation being that she’d show up). But just when I thought I was done, new teeth emerged — or didn’t, as was the case with our eldest daughter’s pesky impacted wisdom teeth.
The whole wisdom teeth thing is a drag. They generally need to be removed somewhere between senior prom and high school graduation and first year of college. In other words, not moments in life when you want to give off that chipmunk vibe.
We went with Door Number Three: Ruin part of your first collegiate Christmas break.
The day before the appointment, the office called to confirm. “We have her tomorrow at 11 a.m. Shall we schedule her follow-up for one week later?”
I paused. “Well, one week later, she’ll be in Chicago for her second semester of college, so, no. But I already explained that when we booked the appointment six months ago.” I said this with no tone at all.
“Hmmm. Okay, well, I guess that will have to be fine.” She also had no tone.
It was so great that neither of us had any tones.
I called my dentist friend right away. “When she said it would be fine, I’m pretty sure she meant it was not fine, and now I’m basically doubting my existence as a mother and whether anything can ever be fine again.”
“Esther,” my calm, lovely dentist friend replied, “five days is plenty of time. This will be a straightforward procedure. She will, actually, be fine.”
Fine.
Our daughter was in, under, and done in 45 minutes. I was ushered back to find her in a La-Z-Boy with an IV in a small recovery … closet? Cubicle? I am not sure what the proper architectural designation was, but what mattered was that she was both down four teeth and up a cocktail of sedation drugs.
She’s been under general and twilight anesthesia before and isn’t one of the kids you see on America’s Funniest Videos. She comes out of sedation more vigilante than goofy.
This time, however, she was just so, so sad. She woke up and realized that an infinitesimally small drop of blood, perhaps the size of a spring pea, had fallen on her dark grey sweatpants.
It was barely visible, and yet it was DEVASTATING. She couldn’t talk, of course, but she could point and gesture, sighing in despair whenever she glanced at the spot, shuddering and averting her eyes.
I told her I’d wash it! It’d be gone by the next day! I’d even OxyClean it that night! But those were the wrong answers. An entire afternoon lived with a spot of blood? Was there no justice in this world?
Her kind and obviously brilliant doctor immediately saw how far I had fallen in my job as mom when he came to check on her.
“Oh, my,” he nodded gravely. “That blood spot needs to be cleaned out right away.” He glared at me for the insensitive mother I clearly was while my daughter slumped in obvious relief.
Here. Here was someone who understood her deepest longings in life.
“I’ll call a nurse to address that,” he confirmed before walking out like he’d solved world peace — which had he, maybe? At least in my world.
A nurse burst into our one-person cubicle. She whipped out scrubby pads and peroxide and went to work on the spot as if humanity itself hung in the balance. My daughter stopped sighing and leaking tears and settled into a version of calm that would allow us to leave.
So, Spotgate resolved, I took my drugged and cataclysmically prone daughter home to smoothies, room-temperature soup, and season 42 of Survivor.
Six days later, she went back to college without bleeding out on the plane. And while the oral surgeon doesn’t want to move in with our family as the Teenage Whisperer just yet, at least I know he’s out there.
And that everything is fine.