Bad Mom
Today I think I won the "Bad Mom" award. Here is the evidence against me.
1. We were in Trader Joe's doing some last minute grocery shopping at 8 pm (when all good 5 year olds should be getting ready for bed no less)--late because I was late home from work due to meeting which went way too long and which I didn't have the nerve after my long vacation to walk out of to make it home in time.
2. Max was chomping on the cookies and grapes from the "free sample bar" because we had yet to eat dinner.
3. Max bites down on a GRAPE and hears a loud splitting crack. Sobbing and scared from the sudden pain, blood running down his little quivering chin. "Mommy", he wimpers choking on his tears. "I think I cracked my tooth". I stop to examine the situation. His entire tooth, just a few minutes anchored firmly in his mouth is now loose and wobbly. What's more it is black near the root (perhaps from the blood?). I am convinced that this is because I have not taken him to the dentist. Ever. I hate going to the dentist so much that even the thought of them makes me break into a cold sweat. The little piece of paper with the list of good family dentists that our pediatrician gave me in DECEMBER has sat by the phone. And I have lately let toothbrushing be a battle that I pick only once a day not twice. Now my child has a broken tooth. Its all my fault.
4. I go to the dairy aisle and pick up the milk we came for instead of rushing him out of Trader Joes and to an emergency dental facility. Do they have emergency dental facilities? I am convinced that if I had only taken him to the dentist in the first place I would know EXACTLY what to do in this situation.
5. We come home and drink Smoothies for dinner because he is afraid to chew on anything. Not homemade fruit smooties but the prepared store bought kind that while organic are loaded with organic sugar. The perfect elixer for a tooth problem?!? Everything soft I have has sugar in it. Max refuses to eat soup. I think if I wake the doctor on-call they will tell me I am a bad mother and that there is nothing they can do about it.
6. I can't find the list of dentists--the one that I have stared at every day for six months. I look up the pediatric dentist on-line and get so freaked out that I forget to write down the phone number. I look it up again. I let Max watch TV while I do this despite the fact it is WAY past his bedtime. He falls asleep without brushing his teeth.
Stay tuned. I will let you know if they take me away to mother jail in the morning or worse yet if they have had to yank out all my precious baby's teeth.
