When I was in fourth grade, I had a traumatic experience with my dentist. One of my friends had told me that she had gone to my dentist and said he was really mean. With that in the back of my head and the fact that the dental hygienst was a little rough, I started crying. The dentist came in and started yelling at me and forced my mouth open and I bit him - HARD! My mom heard the commotion and came in to rescue me and shortly thereafter we switched dentists. To this day, I still cringe and get a knot in my stomach whenever I have to get a regular cleaning.
Amaya has had some greyish black stains on her teeth, so we thought we'd better get her in to see the dentist. We've hyped the dentist up quite a bit by reading several books to her and explaining what was going to happen. (I certainly didn't want her to develop a fear of the dentist just because I had a bad experience).
She was very excited that there were plenty of toys and books in the waiting room and LEGOS! When her name was called, she went back and crawled up in the dentist chair, got a bib and fancy protective glasses on. I was getting my teeth cleaned the same time Amaya, but got to watch one of the hygiensts scrape off what's commonly called, "black line stains." Amaya was such a TROOPER!! She happily let 3 different people scrape her teeth, polish them, and examine them. The black line stains aren't anything to be concerned about - it's generally caused by something in her diet, but she doesn't drink juice or eat an excessive amount of food with iron in them, so we're still a little mystified by what caused it. They were able to get off all the stains, so our little girl is back to her beautiful pearly white smile!
At the end of her visit, she got a princess toothbrush, three stickers, and a "jump-a-lope" (jump rope). We asked her if she like the dentist and she said, "Yup! Fun!" Let's hope that continues...