Dentist

Now that I have recovered from making the world's longest blog post, I will tell you about taking Sam to the dentist this morning. This being his first visit, we have talked it up quite a bit at home.

"Oh, you get to go to a special place called the dentist's office where a nice lady is going to look at your teeth!"
"You will get to tell the dentist what all the letters of the alphabet say while she brushes your teeth!"
"If you're good at the dentist, you can have fruit snacks when we get home."
"The dentist's office is such a special place!"

I dropped Afton off with a friend and Sam and I headed over. Upon arriving in the office he found a basket of toys and proceeded to play with them. Happy and ignorant. He even told me that he would tell the dentist "Aaahhhhh..." as she looked in his mouth. Then the hygenist came and called his name.

He looked down and reluctantly followed me back to her area. When I tried to place him in the special chair, he did the limp fish thing and tried to squirm out. So at first I sat on the chair too, facing him and trying to hold him still. But when the hygenist tried to look in his mouth, he turned his head and body and closed his mouth. So she switched sides and he just turned the other way. I knew that wasn't going to work, so I sat in the chair and held him firmly on my lap. I had to hold his head in place. He cried. She attempted to brush. She tried to get him to look at her and open his mouth. It worked a little bit. Then he gagged. Fortunately, he didn't throw up, but he's got a crazy gag reflex (thanks to me) and didn't like the brushing. He kept saying he wanted to go home. Torture. For both of us.

When the dentist came, she had me hold Sam on my lap facing me and then we laid him down so that his head was in her lap. He cried some more, but she was finally able to see his teeth. All clear. When he was done he acted like nothing had happened, gave me a high five and then told the dentist, "Thank you." (I told him to.) And he got a prize from the treasure box. (A little plastic bus with messed up wheels.) Hopefully he'll forget about the dentist before his next visit 6 months from now. Hopefully I will, too.