If you had seen Hudson’s teeth in the last seven or eight months, you might have wondered if I ever brush his teeth. Or if he eats candy for every meal. This is what his teeth looked like before yesterday…
Late last year, Hudson took a nasty fall and cracked six of his baby teeth, four on top and two on bottom. We didn’t even realize his teeth were affected until several weeks later when we noticed they were starting to decay slightly along the crack. We didn’t think much of it — they were just baby teeth, after all!
A few months after that, one of the top teeth broke off, leaving a tiny stub. At some point during those few months, two of the other affected teeth basically began to disintegrate. Thankfully, Hudson never complained of any pain!
As the teeth continued to decay, we finally made an appointment with a pediatric dentist. The dentist’s biggest concern was the possibility of infection and inflammation of Hudson’s gums. He recommended two extractions, six crowns, and two fillings (one composite and one amalgam — and we refused the amalgam!), which would require outpatient surgery under general anesthesia.
We scheduled the outpatient appointment and prayed that Hud would do just as well with anesthesia and surgery as his little brother did six months ago.
The surgery was yesterday, and everything was successful! The bottom two teeth have stainless steel crowns, which Hudson thinks is “so cool.” 
He now has a large gap on top, but the dentist mentioned that the permanent teeth might come in a little sooner than normal since those baby teeth roots have been removed.
Hudson is recovering quickly — he’s already back to his normal self today! We appreciate everyone who prayed and offered help (and we’re so grateful for my parents who kept Calla and Boulder overnight so Eric and I could both go to the surgery.) The option of dental restoration is such a blessing…it’s absolutely amazing to me what a dentist can accomplish in an hour-long procedure. We are very thankful!
-Abby
Hey Abby…I was interested in your post because James seems to be having some of the same problems – his teeth just seem to be rotting and falling apart and we haven’t been able to figure out why, as we don’t let them have nearly enough candy, soda, or sugar to cause this! I can’t help wondering if something similar happened to him – maybe he fell and cracked his teeth without us noticing? He is definitely our most pain-tolerant child, so I suppose that’s a distinct possibility. We haven’t taken him to the dentist yet because we figured they were his baby teeth and going to fall out anyway (and also we’re in denial because of the expense – owning our own business, we don’t exactly have dental insurance!
. But I was just wondering what persuaded you to have all the crowns and fillings, since Hudon’s are baby teeth too, and I know you guys are fairly natural/low intervention as far as medical stuff goes? I have read some data on raw milk helping to actually heal cavities and make teeth stronger…but unfortunately we can’t get James to drink milk. ;-( But if they are cracked teeth rather than traditional cavities, that probably wouldn’t help anyway.
I’m honestly not even sure which fall caused Hudson’s teeth to crack!
He is our clumsy one and is *constantly* falling flat on the ground. He had several especially nasty falls within a couple of weeks before we noticed his cracked teeth. So I’d say it’s possible that the same thing could have happened to James! We felt it was necessary to have his teeth repaired because they were decaying so quickly and it was starting to hinder his ability to chew some foods. If he would’ve been closer to losing his baby teeth anyway, we might not have done anything. But he’s only 3 1/2 so he has at least 2 years before his baby teeth will start falling out. The dentist was also concerned that with the decay happening so close to the gum line, it could cause infection and abscesses. We got Hudson on Medicaid just for this procedure…we try to avoid government assistance as much as possible. 
Without insurance, the cost would have been at least $2,200… ack! I don’t know much about natural remedies for dental problems. My personal opinion is if his teeth aren’t bothering him or affecting his ability to eat, I wouldn’t worry too much about it!
Haha…it’s really hard as a parent to figure out the line between “leave it alone,” “wise intervention,” and “neglect,” isn’t it?
That is always my struggle! I am especially concerned about doing dental procedures on James because he already has some allergy issues, so I’d really like to avoid putting any metal in his mouth. And since they’re baby teeth, and he’s older than Hudson – he’s 4 1/2, and kinda big for his age – I wouldn’t be too surprised if he started losing his teeth soon. He doesn’t seem to be in pain when eating or when we brush his teeth, and his gums look okay, so I think we’re just going to keep an eye on them and hope they fall out before they get really bad – only one molar actually has a piece missing, and the rest just have little dark spots that look like cavities. I just can’t think of anything else that would have caused such rapid decay…my only other theory is that maybe, since he is gluten free, there might be some essential mineral or vitamin in wheat that he isn’t getting? It’s so weird. I will have to do more research. Thanks for the info. Trying to gather everything I can to make good, informed decisions! 
Yes, it’s so hard sometimes to know when we actually need to intervene! Hopefully James’ permanent teeth will be healthier than his baby teeth. (That’s what I’m hoping for Hudson!) Besides his cracked teeth in front, he also had two cavities in his molars. Both Calla and Boulder’s teeth look great, so I wonder if Hudson just got the bad dental genes.