PracticingContentment

I can't even begin to lay out the details of what a cruddy day it was today. It has ended up turning out ok, but it was difficult.



Bec had a dentist appt early today. I shared on my blog awhile back that he needs a lot of work done to his teeth. There is a lot of mommy guilt going on with that, but I've been able to let some of it go due to the fact that his teeth suffered a lot while he was in Ethiopia, but it still is hard. Bring on the wrinkle creams!
When I found out that they were recommending that he be put under general anesthesia, I freaked out. He is healthy, but I don't know his history OR his family history with anesthesia and I wanted to take a more cautious approach, using the general anesthesia as a last resort.



I spoke with a friend of mine that works there about my concerns. Even during the initial exams, it didn't seem like the dentist(s) were grasping Becken's history. One even told me that due to Becken's extreme situation of decay, it was a good chance to learn from my mistakes and change our tooth cleaning routine to save Hendrix from a similar fate. So, what about Ivy's near perfect dental health? Let's forget, or not acknowledge that our middle child had no prenatal care and was severly malnourished as an infant. It's just mom's laziness to blame.



Anyway, my friend said that she had discussed my wanting to leave the anesthesia as a last resort and that the pediatric dentist wanted to have a consult with me to address my concerns. They would schedule a visit with minor work to get a feel for Bec's response to having dental work done. These conversations have been happening for weeks.



Today I go in for the consult and the pediatric dentist really rubbed me the wrong way. I felt like I was getting his standard spiel to convince me to do things his way. When I brought up the adoption, he tried to schmooze me by saying, "Oh, I've worked with all kinds of children from all over the world." Then goes on to list every nationality he has worked on. Then he tells me that any kind of pediatric dentist in the valley has been trained by him. He asks me, "Is he healthy?" I'm thinking, his freaking chart is in your hands and you haven't read anything about him??? Then he says, "I've worked on heart patient kids. I've worked on kids that have chemo. In fact, I've worked on kids that are terminal" WTF?