The Tooth Fairy Hath Cometh

Right after Little Bee's PD visit, the girls and I had lunch in town and then adjourned to a dentist. Yes! It's Big Bee's first visit to a dentist. I had been fretting over this for days, remembering all the past nightmares of a little screaming Big Bee in front of doctors, worrying if she will cry, if she will act up at the dentist. She had to have her lower tooth extracted because the new tooth is growing out in a slanted fashion.

Really, all these fears were allayed the moment we stepped into the dentist's. Big Bee admitted to me she was very frightened and nervous, but she went about playing with her little sister, in the hopes of distracting herself. Very wise tactic.

Soon, it was her turn to be on the dentist's chair! Dr Elizabeth Tan is an excellent pedadontist. She started chatting with Big Bee who responded to each of her questions like a gallant little soldier. Upon discovering that it was Big Bee's first visit to the dentist, she took out a Barney story book and took her time explaining every single procedure and strange-looking dental equipment in the room. Big Bee cheered up right away.

As Dr Tan went about tinkering through her equipment, she explained each step in kiddy language, so Big Bee could understand her perfectly. As she was putting on the local anaesthetic cream onto Big Bee's lower gum, she told Big Bee that this was a cream that will make her tooth "go to sleep". She also counted all the teeth in Big Bee's mouth (she has 20 teeth in all!), and as she was injecting a HUGE needle into her mouth, she told Big Bee that she was just going to insert a needle and will be counting to ten. Clever way of distracting the kid, because Big Bee told me she only remembered the counting and claimed she did not even notice the gigantic needle!

Finally, after polishing her teeth, she told Big Bee that she was going to perform a "rock and roll" so her loose tooth can come out!

My heart was bursting with pride as I gazed at brave Big Bee, who was gamely nodding and chatting so cheerily with Dr Tan and the nurses. She had indeed come a long way from the hysterical toddler in front of doctors. Dr Tan told me that she was very impressed by Big Bee, especially since this was a first visit. And the nurses kept giving me the thumbs-up and praised Big Bee incessantly after the ordeal.

As for Big Bee, she told me she enjoyed the experience and was not frightened at all, although she did panick slightly when her lower lip became numb after the injection - a totally new sensation to her.

At night, we read a storybook titled "Tooth Fairy", filled with fabulous adventures of a boy and his sister in the land of the Tooth Fairy. Big Bee kept wondering if the Tooth Fairy is a myth or reality. I told her to test the theory by putting her extracted little milk tooth underneath her pillow when she slept.

Guess what? The next morning, she woke me up excitedly at 7am just to show me ecstatically a package under her pillow. A package with a little pearl bracelet, Pooh badge and 2 golden $1 coins. And her milk tooth? It was nowhere to be found... :)