Time for the Root Canal

If you’ll recall, TRC knocked out his front tooth last January. Since then, he’s been bouncing back and forth between dentists as they decided how best to treat it. From what I understand (which, admittedly, isn’t much when it comes to dentistry), the tooth still was growing, and so they wanted to let the root live for as long as it could before they killed it with a root canal.

Well, last week his lip swelled up like a balloon. The tooth had gone into abscess, and so after going to two more dentists, the verdict was clear at last: root canal time.

I feel really bad for TRC. It’s been really rough for him as he’s geared up for this procedure time and time again, only to have the sentence commuted at the last minute. All that meant was that it gave him more time to think about what this was going to be like, and to worry about it more.

Last night, he couldn’t sleep because of nerves. He came down to talk to me, and I chatted with him for a while about it. He talked about how he wished there were some other way to fix things, but I just had to tell him the truth: sometimes life is hard. Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do, or things we really wish we could avoid. Our choices have consequences.

The thing is, a lot of the time we like to talk about those consequences when the choices that were made were bad ones. But the truth is that often we have bad consequences from choices that never deserved them. TRC was just going out to go ice skating for an afternoon. He wasn’t monkeying around. Wasn’t doing anything he shouldn’t. He had an accident, plain and simple.

And now he has to deal with the consequences.

Part of me really wishes I could intervene for him somehow. I think if I could, I would. But in a way, I’m quite glad that I can’t. Life has plenty of things that we have to do that can’t be avoided. I’m not saying it’s absolutely necessary that a 10 year old learn this, but at the same time, I can think of some harder ways to learn it. Yes, this is going to hurt, I told him. Yes, it won’t be fun. But the good news is that it’s something a lot of people go through. It’s something that can be fixed.

(Please don’t remind me of this post when the time comes for me to get a root canal. I’ve never had one, and I think I’d be just as nervous as TRC.)

In any case, if you have a second to send some good thoughts or prayers TRC’s way around 2pm EDT, I’m sure it would be much appreciated. For that matter, some thoughts and prayers my way would be appreciated too. I’m quite nervous for him, myself.

Looking forward to 3pm, when it’s all completed.

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