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Friday, October 17, 2008

More Teething

Sometimes when Rachel screams I get a real good look in her mouth. It's actually one of the more pleasant ways for me to look in her mouth--she keeps it open during a real gut-wrenching scream for quite a while and I'm able to peek in her mouth and look for new teeth without getting my finger bitten.

A few weeks ago Rachel opened her mouth to scream while we were out walking and I noticed a big, purplish, black spot on her gums. I was pretty frantic about it because she'd already had one molar come in and this hadn't happened. So called my friend Sara. She said it was probably just her tooth trying to come through.

Molars, apparently, are killer.

She gave me some Orajel and we've been using that for the last few weeks. I realize that it says to only use it for a week at a time on the package, but we've been using it for longer than that anyway. Rachel's gum was black and blue and looked really painful, but the tooth was no where in sight so to keep her sleeping through the night, we'd just numb her gum before bed. She seemed to deal with the pain during the day without it.

I kept checking her mouth periodically, usually when she was screaming, to see if her tooth had popped through. There didn't ever seem to be any progress.

It was still black and blue when Karen arrived and I showed it her. She assured me, as so many other mothers in the branch here, that, although it was pretty gruesome looking, it was probably alright.

And it was.

Yesterday when we got in the taxi to come home, Rachel started howling with her head thrown back, giving me a beautiful view of her mouth. This time, instead of the black and blue gum, there was a little bit of a pristine white tooth showing. Hallelujah! It took that tooth forever to break through.

Now the other side of her mouth looks like it's starting to bruise, she has another molar on the bottom coming and her canine teeth on the top are breaking through as well. Phew! We're almost done with this round of teething! Only 4 more teeth to go until we get another break!

5 comments:

  1. Andrew was a horrible teether. I would talk to the doctor about it. My doctor informed me although Oral-gel is marvelous on numbing the gums, it coats them as well, causing the teething to actually last LONGER! I asked him what I could do to help his pain. He suggested to take a q-tip and soak a little in alcohol and rub it on his gums. I didn't spoon feed him alcohol, nor did I buy a bottle (I had a neighbor put a capful in a baby food jar and it lasted until I threw it out.) It worked for the twins to. The doctor told me that alcohol when absorbed through the gums in they amount a q-tip asborbs is probably safer then the chemicals used to make oral-gel.

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  2. I heard, that a little bit in their bottle before bed helps them sleep too... ;)
    hahahahahahahahahaha

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  3. We actually prefer Hylund's teething tablets--we used those a few times--but her molars look so painful we wanted something a little more immediate.

    Mostly I just let her deal with it on her own, which involves biting a lot of different things. I only put Orajel on when she's cranky beyond belief or when she's having trouble sleeping at night.

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  4. Believe it or not, I got a black and blue blister on my gum in elementary. If i remember correctly, one tooth was trying to come in when the other hadn't completely fallen out yet. yuck. It was front and center, on my top gum and i'm sure it looked disgusting whenever I smiled.

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