Moments in My Life

Backdated post 10/2/09.

This was Brandon’s first ever visit to the dentist. Did I prepare him at home? Just a little bit.

1. But we brought him to my dental office once during my regular check up in June 09. He watched for a little bit.
2. We know that he likes to brush his teeth and keeping them feeling clean. We also help him floss his teeth after dinner time every night.
3. We told him at the dentist, he has to keep his mouth open wide so the dentist can clean his teeth nicely.
4. We didn’t read him any books about dentist or show him any DVD about dental visit.
5. We told him, if he did good at the dentist, we would take him for ice-cream.

When the day came for his dental appointment, I was hoping he was ready. And he was. I was amazed and so proud of him.

We visited Dr. Janelle Holden DDS in Manhattan Beach. She specializes in Pediatric Dentistry. Just like a regular (or may be more) pediatrician office, her waiting room is full of toys. She even has video games console in the waiting room. The process of registration for first time patient was a breeze. Our appointment was at 11am and we arrived at 10:45am and we were called inside at 11am.

Brandon met with with Dental Hygienist, Christina. She let Brandon pick out a toothbrush to bring back home. Then she asked me to sit on the chair and have Brandon sitting on me. She was very good in explaining everything to Brandon. Every little things she went into detail. She showed and told him what she was going to do before she did it on him. She talked to him a lot during the cleaning process, practically non-stop. Brandon wasn’t actually listening to her because I knew he was busy watching Monsters vs. Aliens on the hanging LCD TV in the room (good thing to keep the kid distracted).

Next she asked Brandon what is his favorite flavor, whether is cherry, bubblegum or strawberry. We picked strawberry. Then she showed Brandon how she was going to count his teeth but asking me to open my mouth and counted mine. Brandon opened up his mouth and she counted 10 on the bottom and 10 on the top.

After the counting, she did the scrapping of the yellow stuff that stuck on his teeth between the gum and the tooth - we called that the plaque. This was the longest part of the whole cleaning process. When she was done with all the four quadrants, she showed him the water gun that will squirt water into his mouth to clean it. Also, she showed him a small little vacuum that will suck the water out. She touched it on Brandon’s hand to show him how that little thing functioned.

Then she brushed his teeth with the special flavored toothpaste. Again she touched Brandon’s hand with the electronic toothbrush like thing and then only started brushing his teeth with it. After that, she helped him rinsed his mouth again. The second final step was flossing. Since he was familiar with this part of the process, it was no problem. The final thing that Christina did was to apply a coat of liquid fluoride on his teeth and asked us to leave it on for an hour, with no eating or drinking.

Christina gave Brandon some stickers and she left to get the Dentist. While waiting for the dentist to come to check his teeth, I took some pictures around the room.

Dr. Holden came in for less than 1 minute to check on him and gave us some advice on how to take care of the teeth - no gummy bears, apple juice (acidic and too sweet - mostly sugar), ice cream is OK, eat more apples and carrots (clean teeth), keep brushing two times a day (even better if is after each meal) and to come back to see her in 6 months.

Then we were done! It was a 30 minute visit. We took Brandon to Baskin Robbins for ice cream of his choice after one hour. He picked the Vanilla flavor.