"He was NOT the tooth fairy."

Selah recently went to the dentist for the first time.

She had questions about every single device and tool, machine, sound, plastic covering and especially any pastes or gels or colored tubes. Untrusting of the tools and situation overall, Selah kept her eyes trained firmly on the assistant with the sharp, loud, scary-looking tools. I think it may have been the assistant's first day on the job. Selah made her very flustered and nervous, and she dropped several sterilized items as Selah barraged her with questions. I kept assuring Selah that the best, most helpful thing she could do was to plant her little booty down in the chair, and just let them prepare for the exam.

You never want your first-ever trip to the dentist to be a traumatic one, but alas, such is life sometimes. Selah managed to swat the dentist's hand a couple of times as he attempted to administer her first novacaine injection. (This swatting resulted in her entire left cheek and upper lip to remain numb for at least three hours, which created quite a panic.) The dentist was great with Selah, and very kind and tolerant - but I can't say the same for his patient! It was highly traumatic, but thankfully, it was over quickly...

Nothing like a traumatic dental experience to motivate a life-time flosser! She was in tears on the way home, saying, "he was definitely, definitely NOT the tooth fairy. He shouldn't have been trusted."

Teefs

Selah lost her first tooth last year, when she was six. She pushed it around with her tongue until it was barely hanging on by a single thread. Paul and I tried to coach her into a sure-fire method of removal, but she wasn't having any of it. She made multiple excuses constantly:

"It'll come out next year, sometime."

"Maybe if I pour some water on it, then it will melt out."

"I want this tooth forever, I don't want it out."

"After Burning Man festival, it'll come out."

All of her reasons for holding so tightly onto this tiny bottom, barely-there tooth seemed perfectly logical to her... So we let it go, and eventually, it came out. Now, more than a year later, she's lost a grand total of EIGHT teeth - including the top front two teeth. It's taken her face a few months to catch up to the size of these chompers!

Yesterday Selah told a friend at school that there was indeed a tooth fairy, and it was her mom. She was coming off the big yellow school bus, and commanding a group of about 10 children's attention with her story:

"My mom is the tooth fairy for all the children in the world. She goes to their rooms in the middle of the night, she tip toes in there, and she STEALS the teeth! Then, she leaves them all ten dollars, and they wake up and spend the money! Isn't that cool? Isn't my mom, cool?!"

Suddenly, ten children turned toward me, and they all wanted 10 dollars.