Teeth Wars

Ok, so the dentist cleaned Nate's tooth out again today and was impressed that some of the swelling had gone down. There really is no other choice but to wait and see if the amoxicillin, carrot juice etc will work. She said that since some of the swelling had gone down in the past 24 hours, she was willing to wait and give it a few more days before doing anything drastic like cutting the gum and letting it bleed out (*shivers*).

We stepped up the carrot juice (vitamin A for fighting infection) to 4 + glasses a day and Nate has been such a trooper, drinking it even when he felt like he'd had all he could stand. I love that about Nate; when the going ets tough, he never backs down.

Right now, he still has a knot on his gum and his face is still a bit swollen but he doesn't have much pain. He's practicing his violin right now without a care in the world. He's my HERO!

Nate still has a hole in his tooth where the dentist cleaned out and drilled. She taught me how to change the cotton in it and clean it out. We're doing that every few hours or so. I'm so thankful that I found a Mongolian dentist who is willing to work with Nate and doesn't want to jump into doing something so invasive as pulling the tooth or cutting the gum.

Thank you all for your prayers and encouraging comments. I really appreciate you all taking the time to pat me on the back. I really have no idea how I'm supposed to treat something like this. I had my first and only cavity so far when I was 17 and it was not bad at all. I know the infection in Nate's mouth needs to be dealt with quickly but I want to give his body a chance to heal first so that he's not traumatized unnecessarily. Any thoughts on this? Am I doing the wrong thing?

We still need to finish this deal so please continue to pray for Nate through Monday. Hopefully (prayerfully) the swelling/infection will be gone and she'll be able to fill the tooth and we'll be DONE.

What's Been Making Me Smile...

1. My English students
2. Fresh root vegetables
3. A good chunk of beef from the market (I prayed for favor before I went in)
4. A handmade dollhouse in the works for Abi's Christmas present. Shhh.....
5. Kenny and his "big boy" underwear
6. Abi putting Kenny to sleep
7. Fresh, organic yogurt
8. People who pray for us
9. Babies, Babies, Babies; everywhere I look!
10. My new dress boots

This past week was a tough one for me. Lots of lessons learned about faith and resting in my heavenly Father's Word. But I'm glad to see that I still had at least 10 reasons to smile.

Please keep our family in your prayers. Nate awoke yesterday morning with a swollen cheek and a toothache. Come to find out, one of the cavities he had filled last Spring was not cleaned out completely and it got infected. We put him on antibiotics and carrot juice right away and waited for the swelling to go down before taking him to the dentist. The swelling didn't go down and now the dentist wants to possibly cut the gum and let it bleed out. We are all terrified and are praying hard that come tomorrow at 9 am when we see her again, the swelling will have gone down so that such drastic measures won't be necessary.

I feel really terrible. When will I stop blaming myself for every bad thing that happens to my kids? Or is it really my fault? Either way, this feeling of guilt doesn't help. All it does is stress me out and gives me a headache.

Did I mention that Nate brushes at least once a day, usually twice? And that my kids don't eat very much candy and that we seldom drink fruit juices, much less carbonated drinks? They eat healthy foods with calcium (maybe not as much as they should every day, but still!)

Why is this happening to him!?