Truman had his oral surgery yesterday. They put him to sleep in order to remove his abcessed tooth, clean out the infection, and then build and install a spacer/bridge. He was out for about an hour and a half because of the time it takes to build the cast for the false tooth and to create and install the apparatus. He now has an infection-free mouth and a false tooth wired in. The tooth is wired to his back, so he now has a wire all the way around the inside of his top teeth.
The dentist said it was a really bad abcess and that they had to dig a pretty deep hole in his gums to get all the infection out.
He was a bit groggy most of yesterday afternoon and had a lot of bloody drool all day. At one point, we left him watch Mr. Rogers. His response, "Uh Oh, two Rogers." He had a similar reaction to seeing two Daddys. Once we let him get up and move around, he seemed to enjoy the stumbling feeling and all the falling down. He kept laughing at himself. He had a bit of a rough night sleeping. We kept him home from school so that he could sleep in as late as he needed after his rough night. Today, he seems fine.
He's having a lot of trouble talking and has made references to having funny teeth. I think it may take him a while to get used to the wire in, but I think in time, it won't be noticeable and he'll get back to his prior speech level. I think that's how most people feel about braces and retainers and stuff, but not having ever had anything orthodontic, I wouldn't know.
While they had him asleep and while the apparatus was being built, they did a thorough cleaning and did full X-rays. They said his teeth look great otherwise and are showing no signs of decay -- which is great both from a preemie perspective and because of the gene I contributed for really cavity-prone teeth. The dentist said we could wait another two years before another set of X-rays.
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