“Don’t worry, dear. When it’s your own child, you won’t find it gross.”
Those words from my mother at my baby shower remain etched in my memory. I had banned that cringe-worthy game where melted candy bars are disguised in diapers—simply revolting! It made me wonder how I would handle the real messes that come with parenting. The thought of it frightened me; could I truly become a mom?
Fortunately, my mother was right. I managed to breeze through diaper changes, which were far less traumatic than I had anticipated. Miraculously, I even conquered my intense fear of vomit. My little one constantly spit up and eventually grew into a child who seems to throw up at the slightest provocation. She’s practically my own personal immersion therapist, and now, vomit barely fazes me. We’ve tackled everything from sinus infections to stitches—if it’s a bodily fluid, I’ve probably dealt with it and cleaned it up.
Once horrified by the sight of a microwaved candy bar, I now have the stomach of iron. I feel like I could perform triage in a war zone, so desensitized have I become.
However, there’s one aspect of parenting that I was completely unprepared for—something that nobody warns you about. My Achilles’ heel turned out to be loose teeth. I can handle bee stings, runny noses, and infected scrapes, but a dangling tooth? I need smelling salts immediately!
Before becoming a parent, I hardly encountered loose teeth, so I was blindsided by this fear. Reflecting on my own childhood, I can’t recall a single visit from the tooth fairy, leading me to believe I must have repressed those traumatic memories. For years, I’ve experienced nightmares where my teeth fall out one by one. It’s a common fear, yet it offers little comfort when I wake up in a cold sweat, imagining a future where I chew mashed potatoes with dentures like my grandfather used to chase me with.
Then my daughter turned six, and my nightmares materialized. Luckily, my teeth remained intact, but hers were falling out—an entirely normal milestone in childhood, yet one that I found hard to stomach.
When she first wiggled an incisor in front of me, I literally shuddered. I had to take several deep breaths to avoid losing my breakfast. She found my reaction amusing. For weeks, that baby tooth dangled precariously. I don’t know what held it in place, but I could barely stay in the same room with her as she constantly taunted me with it. Finally, tired of the wiggly tooth, she bravely yanked it out and came running to me, blood streaming down her chin. She looked like she belonged in a scene from a horror movie, and I’m pretty sure I turned as pale as a ghost. I had to call my husband to handle the cleanup while I recovered on the couch like a Victorian lady with a fainting spell.
That night, we experienced our first tooth fairy visit, and let me tell you, our tooth fairy seems to be a novice. She didn’t have change for a ten-dollar bill and was too exhausted to make a trip to the store to break it, thus setting a dangerous precedent by leaving a ten under my daughter’s pillow. If she continues like this, she’ll be broke before my child’s adult teeth even come in!
My kindergartener, ever the little entrepreneur, seized this opportunity and began pulling her own teeth the moment they felt even slightly loose. “Mommy! This is fantastic! I can just yank my teeth out, and we’ll have enough money to go on a cruise!” she exclaimed with delight.
“Uh, I don’t think it works that way, sweetie,” I replied, promptly removing all the pliers from our home. After that, to save me from further agony, she only pulled her teeth at school—apparently, it’s become a popular parlor trick. She’ll be the life of the party someday, or perhaps a rather unsettling performance artist. Who knows, maybe in twenty years, she’ll be a periodontist.
On the bright side, our tooth fairy is finally getting organized. I hear she now keeps a stash of small bills handy to avoid depleting her savings account with all those tens.
As parents, we all have our weaknesses—those gruesome, ugly parts of raising a child that we dread or never saw coming. While my mother was right about some things not bothering me, she certainly missed the mark with loose teeth. I’m working on being tougher when confronted with a baby canine tooth hanging from a bloody socket, but for now, loose teeth continue to be my greatest phobia. I could delve deeper into this topic, but I think I just heard my daughter tying a string to a doorknob.
In summary, parenting is full of unexpected challenges, and for me, loose teeth take the cake. While I have conquered many of the gross aspects of raising a child, this particular hurdle remains a significant struggle.
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