Pearls&Grit

Listen up! I’m shouting today and I’m shouting loud.

When you are a young mother, things move at a blistering pace. Having a new baby is something that no one, no matter how hard they try, can adequately prepare you. Sleepless nights turn into sleepless days, which melt into sleepless weeks and months. Everything you do is completely and totally consumed by this baby. Your needs fall to the wayside.

Add a new baby on top of other kids, who are no longer new babies, but still just as needy, and things have a tendency to explode just a tiny bit.

Even experienced mothers deal with the same blistering pace, as new babies turn into toddlers, children, teenagers, and suddenly become mothers and father themselves. Notice how I never said “Old Moms.” I am here to tell you there is no such thing! New moms, just grow more experienced until all of a sudden, they gain the title of “Young Grandma” which eventually turns into “Experienced Grandma.”

Obviously, finding a healthy balance is imperative to maintaining and creating a healthy lifestyle for everyone involved in your life, but this post today is not to wax eloquent on finding that balance.

Instead, I am going to beller a little too loudly about how necessary it is for mothers to get themselves to the dentist!

The dentist?

We would never dream of missing a dentist appointment for our wee ones, despite the cost. Not even to avoid finding out if we were ultimate failures, moderate, or Mom-Of-The-Year based on how many cumulative cavities are discovered. Every six months we take our babies to the dentist. Maybe even once a year as the whippersnappers grow. Why is it then, that our mothering selves don’t grant our dear mouths the same courtesy?

Well I didn’t. I never went. For my entire married life up to this point, I never made my teeth a priority. For a myriad of reasons. Sometimes I decided I lived too far, sometimes I decided I had terrible insurance, sometimes I decided there wasn’t anyone that could or would watch the kids, and no one in their right mind takes kids somewhere when their mouth is incapacitated. Sometimes I decided I would not be able to swing extra gas that week. All of the excuses? I made them.

A few weeks ago, I made an appointment because my teeth were feeling weird and I thought a good cleaning might be a good idea. Guess what? As a result of not seeing a dentist for nearly a decade, my teeth were a mess. What I thought was saving my family money, convenience and time came back to bite me in the rear big time.

If only I had made myself a priority! If only I had decided that I had the will, so there would be a way! Now I am saddled with an extremely long lifetime of less-than-stellar teeth, a huge dentistry bill at the worst time possible, and a mountain of regret.

There’s not much of a moral to this story other than just a plea to figure out a way to make sure you get the self care you need and deserve. Whether that be the dentist, the doctor, the endocrinologist, the chiropractor, or the podiatrist. Please just go.

You are worth it. Your body is worth it. And your kids deserve to not have to clean your dentures when you are sixty.