Indentured

I’ve got a virtual suit of armour. It was forged during the long, wild, terrifying day when surgeons bolted titanium rods into my daughter’s spine. It resides in a box in my brain, where I can rummage around and find it when I am in need of a bit of protection. There are a few other crazy items in the cranium cupboard, including a sink plunger and rubber chicken, but I have no idea where they came from or what I might need them for. But the armour is fished out regularly, and I’m only just packing it away now after its second airing in the space of a week, during which time I became an indentured* knight.  (*Teeth. I’m going to talk about teeth, you see).

My daughter needs to have braces fitted, and this week she’s had two visits to the dentist in preparation, to have two lots of two teeth removed. And I had to sit there about three feet away whilst they stuck an enormous needle in her gums and pulled out a couple of teeth, plonking them in a little tray right next to me, the roots covered in blood. Then watch it all over again seven days later.

It wasn’t actually squeamishness on either mine or my daughter’s part that had me preparing to don my battle armour, though. Her syndrome comes with a high pain threshold, which sometimes is a Good Thing. Needles and blood don’t especially bother either of us. But I was expecting tears, tantrums, and a general mêlée (wasn’t that the name of the car in the Dukes of Hazzard?) - simply because of a number.

Over the last few months, as my girl has struggled to cope with her anxieties and emotions, she’s been turbo perturbed by the idea of having teeth out. Subtraction has been at the root of her root subtraction. She’s been worried by the idea of having less than 28 teeth. She loved having 28 teeth. That specific number. She likes to ask everyone else how many teeth they have, and a common sight if you watch her talking to someone is how quickly into the conversation she will persuade them to stick their fingers into their mouth and dutifully count up their pearly whites. 

And yet, a meltdown didn’t happen. I think a slight Eureka! moment a few weeks back when we saw an X-ray of her mouth where her wisdom teeth were visible may have helped. “Look!” I told her, grasping at the opportunity that had suddenly presented itself to me. “See those four ‘secret’ teeth there, that you don’t normally see, well, if you count them that means you WILL still have 28!”

Cometh, the hour, cometh the man, or girl in this case. We went in, the uprooting was done, and we went back in the next week and repeated the removal process. Not one word of protest, not one flinch, not one conversation expressing dissatisfaction or worry about the whole thing. 

I shouted out a checklist to her this morning before school.

“Got your bag?”

“Yes.”

“Got your coat?”

“Yes.”

“Got your teeth?” 

“Yes.”

Well, she had to take them in and show them off, didn’t she?

Talking Heads - Pull Up The Roots

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Dentist

My daughter saw the school dentist the other day. Yes, I was surprised they had one, too. Apparently, he’s an NHS dentist who visits the special schools in his mobile dentist’s surgery. Which is in a van. (Now I’ve explained that, he actually sounds a bit like a serial killer, and I’m starting to worry...but I digress).

At this point I would like to remind you that my daughter is obsessed with her teeth.  To elucidate: she has asked me at least half a dozen times every day for the past year how many teeth she has; I then ask if any have fallen out since the last time she asked me; she replies “No”; and I tell her “That means you’ve still got 28.” Then it’s rinse and repeat.

Today, she arrived home happy after school, but then when I asked her how her day had been, she got that look. A potential meltdown was brewing, and I hadn’t spotted it beneath the surface. 

Her eyes brimmed with tears as she recalled her conversation with Dr H. Lecter, or whatever his name was.

“The dentist said I might have to have a brace, Mum. But he might have to take four teeth out.” She looked horrified at the thought of her beloved figure of 28 being ruined. 

And then, thankfully, her face changed again, like a warm wind had suddenly thawed her chilly thoughts. She looked at me, nonchalantly, and raised an eyebrow.

“I told him I wasn’t interested.”

Video is Steve Martin - You'll Be A Dentist (from Little Shop Of Horrors)


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Cast

Every nine months, we had to get my daughter plaster-casted. Wrapped up in warm, Plaster-of-Paris-coated bandages, like a miniature Egyptian mummy.

The problem was that when she finally gained the strength to sit up, she was lop-sided. Scoliosis (curvature of the spine) was diagnosed, and like a sagging bridge, she needed some sort of scaffolding.

This came in the form of a body brace. A plastic strait-jacket which she had to wear day and night. As she grew, new ones were made to fit the exact contours of her wonky torso using moulds made at regular plaster-casting sessions. We used to return from the hospital with white flecks on our clothes and in our hair, like the oddest painter and decorator team you’d ever seen.

Later, when she learned to stand, she had to get up like a baby giraffe, spreading her legs out wide to get her balance, as there was no ‘give’ in her top half.

We could only hug her properly for half an hour around bathtime when we were allowed to take off the brace. My husband and I would fight for cuddles like drinkers jostling their way to a free bar at a wedding, knowing the money would soon run out.

We used to banish night-time fears of monsters by making up a story of how a big, bad wolf crept into her room and tried to bite her, but slunk away, after hurting his teeth on her cast. Mr Wolf told all his monster friends not to try to eat up the girl with the indestructable superhero armour.

She doesn’t have to wear it now. When she was first free of it, she felt vulnerable. And I wished I’d not told her that bleedin’ wolf story.

The video below is 'Cast - Alright'. I resisted the terrible urge to post something by Phil Collins from No Jacket Required. No, no, there's no need to thank me.