Who knew teeth are such a pain?

Now I understand why the dentist harps on us all to brush and floss and visit him/her (again with the Dentist gender thing too -- Dentistess?) regularly. Poor little Ada is having a heck of a time teething. Finally today I broke down and gave her some baby Motrin. The Tylenol isn't cutting it (no pun intended), and the oral gel is only working so well. I have found one trick to stop her screaming though. I put her in the baby bjorn and go walking. And walking. And walking some more. I'm at the point where I want to borrow my neighbor's dog just so I feel that we have a purpose or sense of direction. Today we had to go to the post office and it was a great reason to get out of the house. But I'm not one to just go on a walk. Typically I go with a friend or have a mission. That's one of the amazing things I'm learning about having a daughter. She's making me slow down, pay attention to her and only her, and enjoy some free time for myself. (Unless Rick and I are trying to sit down for a meal in which I'm learning to eat faster than humanly possible, re-heat everything or just eat after my meal is cold, or eat one-handed while bouncing her on my knee or feeding her a bottle.)

I will say that I am very thankful that she decided to start teething while the weather is nice. I can't complain about being forced to go on walks when it is sunny and 70 and the flowers are in full bloom. It's not all that bad. And she has so much to distract her from the pain of her teeth that she just hangs out and quietly enjoys everything she sees. Today we sat on a bench in front of the local ice cream shop and just watched the people go by. It's always fun when they say hi or walk by with other infants and the babies check each other out.

Moral of the story: Try to find the good things when the going gets rough, get creative with ways to distract children from pain, and when nothing else works take a few deep breaths and count to ten slowly.