but that call never comes. 

if you think you're a bad mother, read this.  

so saturday night i'm walking thru the kitchen and look over at my son who is watching tv (about 1 inch away from the screen...which is bad parenting example numero uno).  

i notice that his mouth looks off.   

he's been wiggling his front tooth for a few days, which gives me the willies...so i can't possibly watch when he does that.........loose teeth freak me out.  

anyway, i'm happy to see this tooth prepare to go because it's yellow.  he has a yellow big front tooth because he fell on the playground at school (yeah! not my fault) and damaged the tooth and then had to have a root canal at the age of 2.  ridiculous, right?   

even more ridiculous is that his sister was playing that potato sack race game and fell onto her brothers head one week earlier and slammed her big front tooth into his skull and she too had to have a root canal at the age of 3. 

(yes, my allowing a three year old to stick her body into a pillow case and jump towards her little brother would be bad parenting example numero dos).  

anyway.  so there i have both kids with yellow front teeth and now my sons yellow one is about to fall out...and i'm thrilled to see it go.  

so......i'm walking thru the kitchen and notice that his mouth looks off.   i walk over fully expecting to see his yellow tooth about to pop out and instead i'm faced with a huge, disgusting, bulging, red, growth-like thing on his gum.    

where the hell did this thing come from?  what is it?!  make it go away now!   i immediately think cancer and flip out.  

i call my sister who is an oral surgeon (and so is her husband)....no answer!  

i call my pediatrician who tells me to come into the office first thing in the AM. pronto!  

i go online and find just terrible, terrible, terrible things.  

i call my ex, who doesn't answer, and leave a detailed message.  he doesn't call back!  who does that?  

i email my ex and ask for the dental insurance information he just got with his new job.  he don't send it.  who does that?  

i don't sleep all night.  how on earth can i be such a horrible parent that i don't notice this huge, bulbous thing sprouting from the front of my sons mouth?  what is wrong with me? 

i don't sleep and instead stare at him all night hoping this bulging growth like thing doesn't suddenly explode all over his mouth while he soundly sleeps.  i think about infections and fevers and keep touching his forehead.  i'm a mess.  

next morning i go to the pediatrician who looks at it and says 'pyogenic granuloma'. 

i almost pass out.  what the hell is that?   it's a non cancerous growth like thing that will require oral surgery to shave off.

this is sunday.  why do these things always happen on weekends and nights?  what's up with that?  

i leave a message for my kids dentist that i will be waiting at their door in the AM. please help.  

i call my ex and tell him i need that dental insurance information.  he sounds annoyed and reads it to me over the phone....insisting her sent it....ugh.  

next am, i'm at the dentist office, who by the way isn't working today.  over the phone her receptionist describes all of this and the dentist tells me to get to an oral surgeon.  

i email my ex that i need the book now...or he needs to look at the dental book and find names of drs.  he scans many sheets and emails them over to me. 

meanwhile, i'm asking friends for references.  all the names in my ex's book are unknowns to me.  i tell him so.   i tell him we are talking oral surgery and cutting and our sons mouth and i need to go to someone who is legit and a referral from people we know. 

i will pay whatever it costs to have a pro look at it today and tell me it's not cancer. i don't care.  but it seems all the referrals are not covered by his insurance.  

he writes back with this....."If you want to blow $200 for nothing then be my guest."  

my friend gives me a name.  i go.  he looks at it and says it is so not a pyogenic granuloma.....it is an abscess....the tooth is loose and an infection got it...and the tooth must go.  

insert huge sigh of relief here.

3 minutes later the tooth is gone and my son is looking a little dazed and confused and i'm hugging and kissing him and profusely thanking everyone in the office over and over and over again.  

i gladly hand over my credit card and pay the full price.  i'm smiling. i'm relieved.  my ex will never understand how i could 'blow' money on this....and i'll never understand how he could even for a minute think about money over his kids.  

i guess this is what you call agreeing to disagree?  

for the first time in four years i do not pick up the phone and call him before or after the procedure.  he has made it very clear...four years worth of clear....that he just doesn't really care. 

he likes his kids, sure.  he wants to know what has happened to them....but he's an after the fact dad. 

he doesn't want to be bothered with the here and now situations of life.  he wants the bottom line....the bullet...the summary....after real life dramas have been taken care of, cleaned up, fixed and made all better.  

i'm a sllllllooowww learner.  so it has taken me a very long time to accept this.   i see it. i live it. i know it's true.  but accepting it has been very, very hard for me for some reason.  

so, even though my gut reaction is to call him the second the dr says he needs to have it pulled...i don't.   i resist.   i admit it was hard to do.  

and even when my son is all better and we are driving home and my gut tells me again to call his father and tell him all is well with the world again, that he can go on with life and stop worrying...i resist again. 

my gut is telling me the right thing right now...call...call....call the dad.....but it's also telling me another thing......he doesn't really care paula.  he's not fretting and worrying like you.  he's probably forgotten all about this already and is sipping cafe con leche somewhere and laughing about something some pretty girl just said.  

so i resist and put the phone away.   i don't call.  but secretly i am  hoping and praying the phone will ring and he will be calling to ask how his son is and he will be mad at me for not keeping him updated like i always do...and he will want to talk to our son and ask how he is and tell him it will be okay and tell him how proud he is of him.  

but that call never comes.