Monday, June 15, 2009

A Rough Day for Owen

Today was not such a fun day for us. Although, I think Mom and Dad are taking it harder than little Owen. I was at our post office annex which is literally smaller than my master bedroom. This little room was nothing but walls. No chairs, no tables, nothing to get hurt on. Just a built in counter top and a postage stamp machine. I was putting stamps on a stack of envelopes while Owen and Mason entertained themselves by looking out the window and saying hi to the people as they walked up. The windows were down to the floor and, as in any commercial building, the bottom of the window was framed with a metal frame. There was also a metal mullion running through the middle of the window separating the top and bottom window panes. The kids were stepping up on the little (I'm talking 3 or 4 inches high) metal ledge so they could peek over the top of the mullion in the middle of the window. I heard a clunk on metal and then he let out the most terrifying cry I've ever heard and I knew without looking that he had actually hurt himself somehow...not just the little bonk or scrape that they usually whimper at. I rushed over to him (all of 3 feet away from me), knelt down, and tried to figure out what happened. I was checking his chin, his head, anything. He was still trying to catch his breath and his mouth was so wide open with a breathless cry that his lips were covering his teeth. All of a sudden his mouth started filling up with blood and I assumed he caught his chin on the mullion which caused him to bite his tongue or cheek. As the blood started pouring out of his mouth and he caught his breath, I noticed what had happened. His front right tooth was GONE.

Owen lost his footing and as he stepped down (no, he never actually fell down), his mouth caught the mullion he was peeking over and hit it just right to rip his whole tooth out, root and all. Because we have not needed to take the kids to the dentist, I had no idea who to call. I went into complete panic mode. 911 wasn't right. My pediatrician didn't even cross my mind yet. All I was thinking was how the heck I was going to figure out where a pedodontist was in time to get his tooth put back in. Did I mention it was 3 minutes until 5 pm? What office is going to answer at that hour? How long do I have before the tooth can't be replaced? What about my perfect, beautiful baby boy and his beautiful smile? It will be years before his permanent tooth comes in. I need to call Aaron. Oh my gosh, what do I do first? Cry. I couldn't help it. I kept thinking about how everyone was going to use this as a way to tell him and Mason apart. It made me feel sick and I was about to start throwing up. Luckily, a stranger stepped up and ran to his car and brought me about 50 napkins, another stranger happened to have a case of water in his car and gave me a bottle, and another stranger, named Cathy, told me to wrap the tooth in a wet napkin and put it in milk as soon as possible. I immediately wet the napkin and then Cathy said to me, "load your kids in the car and meet me across the street at Kroger. I'll go over there and send my son in for some milk." Her son, maybe 8 or 9, ran in and brought me a little bottle of milk and a container to put it in. I tried to write Cathy a check but she told me to pay her back by paying it forward. Cathy stayed with me at the car and entertained Owen and Mason while I frantically talked to Aaron who had already gotten in touch with a pedodontist (after hours on his personal cell phone). We were told that baby teeth can't be re-implanted because of the risk of infection or damage to future adult teeth which are forming. NOT what I wanted to hear. The glimmer of hope though? In six months or so we can possibly do a 'pedi partial' (a little fake tooth for appearance and spacing purposes). In the mean time, after freaking out over the phone to my mom, she called our long time family friend who happens to be a dentist. He talked like we may be able to find someone who would re-implant it. So I frantically called as many of the pedodontist google results I could find. And yes, I called the emergency number with no shame. I figured they'd feel bad for me since I was STILL crying when I talked about it. Same answer though. No re-implantation from the second, third, or fourth opinions.

It was approaching 6 pm now and Owen had long since returned to normal. I was still a wreck though. He was goofing around with Mason, sucking on his pacifier, smiling, laughing. Thank God! But what's for dinner. We (Aaron and I) felt so bad for him and we wanted to get out of the house and do something to take our (read mine and Aaron's) minds off of it. We were going for something soft and something we knew Owen liked. We ended up with spaghetti, pizza, bread, fruit cocktail (Owen liked picking out the cherries), and banana pudding. He was feeling great because he ate like a 10 year old! That boo boo in his mouth didn't hold him back at all. Now we're on a rigid Tylenol routine to keep the pain under control until morning.

We're heading to the pedodontist tomorrow for x-rays to make sure the other teeth are still intact and that there are no more pieces left from the tooth that did come out. I will update once we know what the next step is. I am not ready to post pictures of my baby boy just yet. I'm still in shock and I feel so bad for him. I just don't feel right about posting pictures to "show it off." You know us and you know we take lots of pictures. On our next adventure we will take pictures just like we always do. Somewhere in there I'm sure there will be a picture of little Owen's battle scar.

*******
Since writing and posting this recap of today, a strange thing happened. Aaron went to bed and left the TV on TLC. I was bored with the show that was on so I switched it to Discovery Health which was showing 'Mystery Diagnosis.' The story they were profiling was about a 3 year old little girl who had a bump on her shoulder. After tests, it was decided that surgery was needed to remove the bump. Once in the OR, the doctors decided the only option was to amputate her arm, up to her shoulder. As it turns out, she was misdiagnosed and the amputation was unnecessary. What she actually has is not any better. A disease that causes bone to calcify and creates a second skeleton which of course leaves the person immobile.

I don't think it was a 'fluke' that I happened to turn this show on. All afternoon and evening I have been having a very hard time believing that Owen actually lost his tooth. While it still makes me sad, I am so thankful that it is just a tooth. It is nothing permanent, and it is definitely not an arm, leg, eyesight, etc. God has a funny way of keeping me in check. Things could be worse, much worse. And as soon as I start to feel sorry for myself, for Owen, He reminds me how lucky I am. I know He is looking out for my babies. In fact, just last Saturday Aaron and I were on our way home from dinner with friends. My mom was in town and she was keeping the boys. We exited off of the Beltway and made our usual turn onto the Fort Bend Tollway. As we were turning under the Beltway, a car traveling at least 60 or 70 mph blew through two red lights right ahead of us. We were literally 5 seconds or less from that intersection. 5 seconds from being t-boned on the passenger side. I have no doubt in my mind that my life would be very different right now had we been just 5 seconds earlier. And as much as I hate to say it, that car was going so fast, I can't help but think that I am lucky to be alive. It really shook me up and I cried for the rest of that night and was still very upset the next day. If Aaron's key would have opened all 4 doors of the car instead of just the driver's door on the first try, I would have hopped in the car and we would have driven away, 5 seconds or less before we actually did. Thank you God for watching out for my babies. You know they need a mommy and a daddy, and You know I need my babies.

So no more taking things for granted. Say a prayer and count your blessings. I bet we all could do it a little more often.