Today was one of those days as a parent when I wished I had a magic wand. It's not all that unusual a wish when raising little kids but often you wish for it just because you're tired of waging the battle it requires to turn savage children into civilized human beings. Today it was because I couldn't take my kid's pain away and that sucks.
Jamie is working on teeth again. I've known for about a week that he was getting one of his upper molars. It's been s-l-o-w-l-y pushing its way through his gum - have I mentioned lately that my kids teethe at a glacial pace? - but he's been increasingly cranky and inconsolable over the last several days. He hasn't been eating normally and he's just fragile. He cries and freaks out at the drop of a hat and then turns around and starts playing a game and giggling. It's like watching Bipolar Childcare Theater.
Last night he refused to eat a single bite of dinner. For Jamie, that is simply unheard of. That kid has never met a meal he wouldn't try. He refused PANCAKES of all things. I saw him ignore a banana the other day and that's easily his favorite food. In the wake of this, I finally pinned him down and got into his mouth to see what was happening.
It was so much worse than just a single molar.
He has BOTH bottom eyeteeth also coming, in differing degrees of being ready to break through. Well. No wonder he's been inconsolable. Three teeth at once would make anyone cranky.
In light of that we've been laying on the Tylenol and Advil in alternating doses in an effort to keep the pain under some kind of control. I've also been using Anbesol to numb those spots and give him some brief respite from the pain.
But today, no matter what I did or how I tried, things only kept getting worse. He refused dinner again and ended up eating half an oreo and drinking a sippy of water. He was screaming and crying and freaking out over the tiniest things. He would come to me and climb into my lap while crying and when I got the tears to stop he would just moan. He wanted nothing more than for me to take the pain away and was really mad that I wasn't fixing it.
And then I found another tooth.
I was numbing up the spots I knew about and found that his other upper molar is also coming through. I nearly fainted dead away.
So, I finally knew why he'd been so difficult but I still couldn't fix it. He'd had all the medication I could give him, and he was still refusing food and having meltdowns right and left. Before I got him into bed, all he wanted to do was cuddle with me and moan. In the end, all I could do was rock him, kiss him, and tuck him into bed. And then go cry that I couldn't help him.
But if I ever meet the person or deity that decided to make him go through the agony of breaking four teeth at once, I am going to give them a hard kick to the donkey omelets.
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