Cracked

The other night after eating popcorn, E thought she had a popcorn shell stuck between her teeth and asked me to help her get it out with a flosser pick. When I looked at the tooth, I didn't see any shell but it looked like her tooth was ridged, and I told her that's just the way her tooth was. As I looked more closely at the tooth, it looked like her tooth was cracked horizontally, sheering upward toward the inside. I told her to show it to Josh, and he agreed that the tooth did indeed look cracked. Since it wasn't hurting her, we decided to keep an eye on it. (It's the first molar on her top right. Thankfully it's a baby tooth.)

Over the next couple of days, the tooth had gotten discolored and looked like there was blood caught inside of it, but it still didn't hurt her. When I was at work, a church member who is a dental hygenist came in, and I mentioned E's tooth to her. She said that as long as the tooth isn't hurting her, it should be okay, but if it starts hurting, E will probably need to get it pulled.

Then, that night when E was brushing her teeth, the top part of the tooth closest to her gums on the outside broke off. It looks like you can see part of her gums peeking through. The tooth is only a little loose, not any more than before, but E is saying that it hurts when she bites down. I thought that the now-exposed part of her gums might just be sensitive there like when you lose a tooth, but after a couple of days, she still says it hurts, so it looks like we'll need to make a trip to the dentist soon.