Swish, spit, rinse!

Growing up we went to my dad's cousin for all our dental needs, and even now most of us still do. We loved Reed and think he's the best dentist ever. "Breath deep through your nose, my friend, breath deep through your nose." And as Priday's go (that's my family) we have hyperactive spit glands. Pavlov's dog fits our family really well. I went in to pay a bill and i thought i might need suction before i left the building. Last year when we were up in Canada visiting my parents we joked that it doesn't take much to get the glands going either. My parents and Blake and I had a good laugh about those hyperactive glads (it was late and we might have been a tad tired). Good times. One of the other memories of going to reeds office was from my younger years. We went in every 6 months for our check ups. There were a couple hygienists that worked there at the time. The one that this story goes too is the RED-HEADED HYGIENIST!!! (sounds scary doesn't it!) Sadly, i don't know her real name but all my siblings will no doubt know who I'm talking about. Honestly, i didn't have any problems going to the dentist and i went many times because we have such great teeth. We are a dentists dream come true, and a family of it too. Good thing we had a dentist in the family. Anyway, when we knew the appointments were coming up, we (me and my siblings) would hope and pray that we didn't get the dreaded red-headed hygienist. Sure, sure, the cleaning wasn't too bad, but after the cleaning came the flossing! oh my goodness. Your gums got in the way of her flossing your roots, and she'd lean into it too. Now I'm sure part of the reason it seemed so harsh was because we didn't floss regularly anyway, but i am not kidding it was soo painful. Fortunately for us Priday kids, and heaven knows how many other kids, she moved on (I'm not sure if she moved or if she went to another office). It was a relief for us to know that we were going to be flossed with great care after that. Fast forward to this last week. All three of the boys had their cleaning and check-ups. Blake was out of town so i was there with all three boys on my own. Which I'd like to say is not a big deal, but some days anything with all three boys is a big deal. We got to the dentist office right on time and were waiting in the waiting room when i saw her! Her, as in the dreaded red-headed hygienist. I panicked just a little in my own head praying that she was just saying hi, but alas, she was working there, today! I took a deep breath and prayed that the other hygienist would be the one to call the boys back. About 5 minutes went by and i suddenly heard someone coming down the hall towards the folders at the front to call the boys back......it was the drhh. She called Ethan and Sam's names. DANG! Up the boys popped and headed back to the chairs, having no idea what was about to happen to them. Ethan went first and was fairly good, except for bouncing his feet while she was trying to scrape his teeth. Sheesh! I took another deep breath when the flossing began. Ethan's feet were not kicking to get up higher on the chair like i remembered doing. So it must be ok. Ethan's pretty tough though. Then Sam. Now Sam, has some some issues when it comes to the dentist. He does not like the x-rays. No i dare say he hates them. It's a battle every time at this point in the visit. I tell him if he's really good he can have _____, or if he's really good and has no cavities then he can have ____. Then it becomes a big fight with his tongue getting in the way and the hygienist maybe getting bit a time or two. Then i have to get mad at him and take his favorite toy away or say he can't play the gameboy for a week, whatever to help get him to hold still and just do the x-rays. Today, the drhh just said, well let's just see how things look as we clean. Of course at this point Ryan is then called by the other hygienist. At least he was spared, my baby was spared. Ryan is such a good kid that he climbed right up into the chair opened really big at the right times and even had no issues what so ever with the x-rays. He looked so small in the big dentist chair. I had to go back and forth to where Sam was to where Ryan was, actually spending more time with Sam since he was struggling to hold still. Lucky for me, he didn't seem to have any issues with the flossing either. And really to sum it up. Ethan had one small cavity and Sam (as far as we know) was good and Ryan was cavity free. I lived to tell the tale, they lived through the flossing, and good news for us, she was just filling in for one day!

Ryan showing off his clean teef!