Pressure

Poor Big Girl... She's the shortest in her class. She is the last to loose her teeth as well. I didn't truly appreciate the gravity of the situation until I had my first time visit to her classroom the other day. There's a lot of pressure in first grade. Pressure to do your own work, pressure to be big, pressure to learn all those slap-hand rhymes about your 'boyfriend behind a magazine' and the 'local law enforcement in Mexico peeing in the streets.' Pressure!

Pressure to lose teeth didn't cross my mind, but when I thoughtfully noticed that Samantha has a horizontally positioned upper central incisor (it looked like it wasn't mobile and needed an extraction- I'll leave that good news for her next dental visit), the response of this girl to my "you have a tooth that's trying to come out" surprised me. "I am already on the top teeth-your daughter is still working on the bottom!" Now I could have gone into a lecture about how lessening the length of exposure is actually a good thing in the mouth. The longer a permanent tooth has to be exposed to the damage of poor oral hygiene and sugar the more likely that tooth will be to develop dental caries. Instead I just said "every one's different Samantha." And took mental note to avoid play dates with that kid.

I was also I bit surprised by my daughter telling us to please please please pull her tooth. "I don't care about the blood and I will even clean it up" she said. Was that the girly inclination to be tidy talking or the desperation to be like everyone else? Maybe a bit of both. Anyways- here is her happy happy end to the story. And a bit of good news- we didn't have any blood stains to clean up!