Open Wide and Say Ouch

Throughout the night, I replayed the events from the previous night in my head. Seeing Tiffany there struggling to keep her teeth and mouth intact was nearly more than I could bear. When we got to the dentist, his office was closed but he was there waiting for us. He quickly examined Tiffany and then went right to work. Because he was alone at the office, Trina became a dental assistant. Although she has not been trained to do this job, I have heard her threaten me on numerous occasions that she would knock my teeth out so I knew she would be fine in this instance. The doctor unwrapped the tooth that had been knocked out and held it up. My first impression was, there was no way that was going to back into her mouth. The root was huge and the hole left in her mouth was quite small. But with a quick flip of his hand, he stuck the tooth back in place. I stood there amazed. It was like watching a magician do a trick. You saw it happen but you had now idea how he did it. The doctor then went to work on the other two teeth moving them around and standing back asking us if that was how they went. It was an eerie feeling watching him mold my daughter's mouth like playing with Play-doh. When he finally had them situated, he wired them together just like braces. Tiffany, to her credit was tough as nails. I would have been passed out cold. She just sat there and took it. Trina on the other hand was having a ball. She had all kind of gadgets sitting around and she was working them all. She had that suction thing going and was vacuuming Tiffany's mouth out with regularity. Then she was handing the dentist instruments working like a team. It was like watching oral ER. I was pretty impressed with the whole situation. When they were done, it looked like Tiffany was wearing braces. She was told that she could not chew with those teeth for a couple of weeks. She listened to the doctor's instructions carefully and when he asked if she had any questions, she only had two. When could she go back to school and when could she return to gymnastics? My admiration of my daughter went way up through this experience.