I was all set to write about that horrible stage in development when you need to have “The Talk.” You know the one about the birds and the bees but then I was making dinner last night and my oldest son yelled out, “My tooth is really loose!”
Oh, no! I knew that this day was coming but I was hoping that he would keep his baby teeth for a few more years. I decided to check his mouth to make sure that it was truly what I thought it was. Sure enough, his loose tooth was hanging there by a small piece of gum (most likely the nerve) and the second adult tooth was already poking up, ready to take its place.
I’m not sure why I was upset about seeing that adult tooth in my son’s mouth but as I was trying to figure out the reason for my distress, my son yelled out, “Isn’t that great, I’m growing up!”
And that was the whole reason behind my feelings. My son was growing up. He wasn’t the little baby with all his baby teeth, he was now the school age child with his own hockey team, school friends, teacher and life that doesn’t involve me. All those things should have alerted me to the fact already but the tooth falling out was what tipped the scale for me. He is, in fact, growing up and no matter what I do, I simply can’t stop that.
I spent last night feeling a little melancholy but I performed my task as “Tooth Fairy” after he was fast asleep. It is sad that they grow up so fast and it seems sad that they are so eager to grow up. I remember that age so well, the eagerness to just be old enough that I stopped counting my age in years and started with quarters. “I’m 6 and 3/4 years old,” I would say when asked my age. It didn’t help that my birthday was at the end of the school year so all my friends turned a year older ahead of me. Cutting my year into quarters made it seem like every four months I would be a little wiser, a little more grown up.
So although I am happy that my son is growing up, I really wish that he could slow down for just a little while. On the bright side though, we’ll get some really great pictures of him with his teeth missing to put into those scrapbooks and we get a visit from both the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny this weekend.
So just between parents, how did you feel when your child lost his or her first tooth?
Sirena
