Teething

Santa Claus?  Fun.  Easter Bunny?  A little weird but the eggs were cool.  The tooth fairy?  Terrifying.  The thought of this little fairy wanting to collect teeth is just creepy to me. I remember being afraid to go to sleep when I lost my teeth. I’ve actually laughed out loud seeing a few things on pinterest about mother’s decorating dollar bills with glitter and websites where you can insert a picture of the tooth fairy into your child’s room.  Out of curiosity I looked up the origins of the tooth fairy.  Apparently, parents around the world have been rewarding their children with money or a small gift for the loss of their baby teeth since the era of the Vikings (according to the wildy accurate Wikipedia).  Now that I’m a mother and he has teeth, I have a theory on this.

Here’s the truth about teething.  It’s ugly.  It’s slobbery.  It’s painful.  It’s miserable.  Our little fella has been working on teeth for about a month now.  We tried teething rings, ice cube in a washrag, massaging his gums, and frozen celery (this was the best).  They all worked to a degree but he was just plain pitiful hitting his mouth with his fists, crying through the night, and then slobbering.  Good Lord the slobbering!  I really thought he would get dehydrated because he was just a gross little drooly mess.   He got his first tooth on July 5^th (a little over 5 months old) and then we got the 2^nd tooth a few weeks ago (just barely 6 months old). 

Between constantly checking his temperature, giving him Tylenol, and seeing him chomp on anything that can fit into his mouth, we’ve earned these teeth damn it!!!  The thought of them falling out kind of pisses me off.  Not after all that we’ve been through!  Of course parents invented the tooth fairy to mark the loss of these little weird bones in our mouth that made the whole tribe miserable for months at a time.  I’m going to make a big deal about the tooth fairy.  Teddy is going to be real confused when no one else's tooth fairy brings $5 and their parents don't spend the day at the spa to celebrate the loss of a tooth.

Chew.  Cry.  Chew harder.  Scream.  Chew again.

Drool.  I had just changed him and couldn't find a clean bib.

Sucking in his bottom lip because those are the teeth he has.  Still drooling.

Seriously drooly.

Once his ears started hurting he just wanted you to hold his head.

Cute pic after his first tooth popped through.

This took about 45 minutes to get this pic this morning and you still can't even see the 2nd tooth.