A few weeks ago, Lisa texted a group chat about one of her sons losing a tooth, and how she helped with the final extraction process.
Kae immediately replied that tooth removal grosses her out. I jumped in to say that I absolutely refuse to have anything to do with removing my kids’ teeth.
I love my kids. I support them. I will not pull out their teeth.
Which is ironic, because growing up, my dad pulled all of mine.
Aside from one loose tooth that got knocked out by someone’s knee—and another that fell out while I was sleeping (which I swallowed… GROSS)—my dad pulled out all of my teeth. I refused to do it myself. I don’t know why? It just terrified me.
He was efficient but I still hated every second of the experience.
Clearly these experiences left a mark (I can still remember being so relieved when I lost my final baby tooth).
Fast-forward to adulthood and tooth removal is not part of my parenting skill set. I’ll offer encouragement. I’ll provide snacks afterward. But I might also excuse myself to go sit in the other room pretending THIS IS NOT HAPPENING. I don’t know why! It’s not that gross. It’s not even my tooth! I’m not particularly grossed out by blood. But I just cannot handle teeth coming out.
This felt like it had the makings of a blog post…
I can’t wait to hear everyone’s thoughts and experiences:
- Has you ever swallowed a tooth?
- Did you pull your own teeth?
- What about your kids—who handles it at your house?
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I assume I pulled out my teeth, unless it was my mom ( who,, as a nurse, took care of that stuff). Whoever did it, it wasn’t traumatic.
My kids mostly popped out their own; I’ve helped out rarely. I’ve had to have the dentist do it for two kids- one was sqeemish and wouldn’t wiggle her tooth and they had to come out ( I didn’t love paying for it but I wanted to avoid any more drama). The other had the adult tooth coming in and the baby tooth wouldn’t wiggle.
No swallowed teeth here. ( broken teeth, chipped teeth, and wisdom tooth surgery though.) Tooth removal doesn’t gross me out- having a tooth just hanging there or the constant wiggling by a kid drives me nuts. Just get it out already!
My mom was a nurse but I can’t recall her ever handling tooth removal. That was 100% my dad!
Now that you mention it, I actually did have to have a number of teeth pulled by the dentist because my baby teeth wouldn’t come out.
I only have one memory that stands out – I had a very stubborn tooth that wouldn’t let go. My friend’s dad said, “Bite on my thumb.” So I did, and he yelped in pretend pain, and the tooth popped right out! I have never swallowed a tooth, thankfully.
Bite my thumb. It sounds like the infamous Charlie video. Just think, Michelle: if you had lived in the age of YouTube and TikTok as a kid, you could be famous 🙂
No one ever pulled out my teeth! I would let them come out on their own, and remember being very excited for the tooth fairy. I had to have two teeth out for a brace when I was twelve, which was pretty miserable, and remember being very unimpressed when the dentist handed me the teeth in a tooth fairy bag.
I once heard the change dish hit the floor a few minutes before my pillow lifted and that was it for me believing in the tooth fairy-haha.
Ugh! I’m so glad to be past that stage. I hate the whole tooth dangling by a thread situation, waiting for it to come out. I never pulled any of my kids’ teeth, but I think my husband did assist a couple times. Growing up, all my teeth came out on their own so I guess I just felt like no pulling by a parent was necessary.
My kids have done it themselves for every tooth, I think (except for a few times they were at the dentist and had loose teeth and the dentist just took them out).
What a good question! My mom pulled my baby teeth and I have mostly been in charge of managing the baby teeth in this family but have never managed to pull them with dental floss like my mom did. Mostly I waited until their teeth were so loose that they could pull them out wrapped in a tissue. One child has swallowed a tooth in their sleep and Nellie had a period of time where she was losing so many teeth in such quick succession that I was starting to get worried but thankfully that tapered off quickly!
Someone who actually used the dental floss trick!!!
My dad always used a clean handkerchief or Kleenex, too!
I am not the tooth parent! I get the ick from teeth (and may have accidentally knocked out one of my daughter’s pulling a shirt off her excited little head the night she lost her first tooth, oof. I am the dentist parent, though…
I am mostly the dentist parent and I am almost exclusively the orthodontist parent!!!
It’s quite exciting at our house when there are loose teeth. It’s always different on what the boys will try. Yes, we have tied them to door handles and slammed, biting into apples and all the rest! Here’s a strange thing, my youngest would rather keep his teeth most of the time than give them to the tooth fairy, like why? Does anyone else’s children do this?
Last summer, while cleaning out my drawers, I found some of the kids old teeth in a Tupperware (even writing this seems a little odd and Hannibal Lecterish)! Why would I keep their old teeth? Does anybody else keep their children’s set of baby teeth? If so, what are we going to do with them? Hand them to them as a necklace when they head out for college? Am I supposed to keep them forever? Is there a time limit before it’s okay to throw these in the trash?…. After great deliberation on my crazy I did end up getting rid of them but have to admit there was a bit of sadness in doing so. 🤷🏼♀️😁
OH MY GOODNESS! I love that someone has done the string + door slamming thing. HILARIOUS.
I feel like people used to save first teeth for baby books (along with some hair) which feels strange to me, but I think it was pretty standard. My kids definitely kept some of their teeth but they can have them. I do NOT need to inherit those. Yuck.
I am glad I gave you some blogging fodder. I am the tooth puller in my family but I will only do it if the child requests it. I don’t know why Paul can’t just finish it off. It’s hanging by a thread when I pull it. It doesn’t gross me out though. There isn’t much that does gross me out, though. I have an abnormally high tolerance for really gross stuff.
I don’t find it gross per se, even… I just don’t know what it is about teeth coming out. I just don’t like it!!! Maybe because I hated it so much as a kid. I think it was the sensation. Ugh, even just thinking about it gives me the shivers-haha.
Never swallowed a baby tooth, but I did swallow a crown! I was eating very chewy candy and off it came and down it went!
I remember crying when I lost my first tooth, so maybe it hurt a little? Or maybe I was just freaked out by the really very tiny amount of blood.
Eeks! A crown!!! You need the tooth fairy after that.
I hated the taste of the blood from a freshly pulled tooth. Gross! Once the tooth was out and my mouth was clean I didn’t mind it. I also hated the sensation of having a wiggly tooth.
My dad used to always threaten me with the pliers, so in self defense I pulled out my own teeth. Once when I was about six or seven I didnt want to eat the kielbasa at dinner (gross white bits in it) and so I sat there wiggling a loose top tooth until it came out right there at the table! I don’t think we ever had kielbasa again. Ha. I always pulled my kids teeth, I found it very satisfying. Some of my kids wouldn’t let me until there was literally just a thread holding it in their mouth!
Pliers. CAN YOU IMAGINE. I would have had nightmares.
I cannot imagine finding it satisfying to pull out my kids’ teeth… but I LOVE peeling skin (like from a sunburn or if they have peeling toes…which is CLEARLY GROSS, but I LOVE it and find it so satisfying).
I find the whole thing very gross, too! I think I did swallow a tooth as a child. I really don’t remember much about pulling out my own baby teeth though. But I do remember my Dad volunteering to tie a string to my tooth and a doorknob and slam the door. LOL! I did have to pull out some of my own kids’ teeth, but not that many. Sometimes, they’d lose them at school and the tooth would come home in a film canister with a biohazard sticker on it! That was post-HIV and people were freaked out about blood. I don’t think they do that anymore, at least not according to my grandkids.
One of my kids definitely lost a tooth at school and the teacher had little tooth containers for it! Clearly she was used to it happening on her watch 🙂
Hmmm, I don’t recall pulling any of my teeth out. Just wiggling them incessantly until they found out. I DO recall having pneumonia when I was six and coughing out my two front teeth that were loose and possibly swallowing one in the ice cream I was eating.
No loose teeth here yet but C checks ALL THE TIME. Her 6th birthday is in 2.5 weeks so I doubt she will get her wish of losing a tooth while 5.
Those are VERY specific memories and I have never in my life heard of someone coughing out their front teeth. Eeks and ick.
Ha! It can be very exciting to lose teeth 🙂 To be fair, I like them losing teeth better than the process of teething!
Gross. No. Never. I brush the dog’s teeth every day, but if anything was actually WRONG, Dr. BB would have to be in charge. Mouths are gross. Teeth are gross. I’m grossed out.
One of my sister’s is a hygienist. There aren’t many jobs I would want to do less! So I get this and agree. Pulling teeth isn’t gross to me totally (I don’t think), but having my hands inside a stranger’s mouth. HARD PASS. I would not make a good doctor, either!
I have gotten all my teeth late, as a baby and the grown up versions, lol … I hated pulling my teeth. In fact, my baby molars – which never really “got” loose – ended up having the roots worn down from the rising permanent teeth and finally had to be “knocked off” the gums. One of them broke, which led to a dentist visit, and the discovery that they were just sitting there doing nothing. Oops? LOL
I don’t do teeth things. I don’t do eyeball things. At all. Of any sort. Mine or anyone else’s. (Which made that scratched cornea extra fun for me).
But I *am* the medic – the one who cleans up and bandages wounds. Go figure.
We haven’t had any eye issues yet but it does NOT sound appealing to deal with either.
I wouldn’t make a very good nurse!