Austin's bump

I've been so sporadic about writing I doubt that anyone is still reading this ... but, just in case, I will blog again! (I keep meaning to get to this, but just seem to put other things ahead of it all the time, which is a shame since I find writing so enjoyable. I'll try to make it a higher priority ...)

About two weeks ago, I had sent Austin up to get ready for bed while I was washing dishes--the typical stuff: brush teeth, put on jammies, etc. He came back downstairs and said his mouth was bleeding. I figured it was a little ploy to stall the procedure, so I told him--without even turning around to look at him--to just not brush so hard and get back upstairs. But then he said something along the lines of "this is gross." So, I turned to look at him. His thumb, index finger and teeth were covered in blood. I brought him over to the sink and told him to spit, got him some water to swish around and cleared his mouth. Then I looked inside to find a growth (about the size of an eraser or a little bigger) on his lower left gum, right long his tooth line. He said it didn't hurt, just that it was bleeding. When I asked if he felt it in his mouth before, he said "no." (Be aware that Austin isn't the most orally aware kid I've ever seen ... he's eaten / swallowed one of his teeth and just recently ate a piece of shrimp with the tail on--continuing to chew it all up and swallow it when I urged him to spit it out, because "it's just crunchy, no big deal" ... YUCK!)

Long story short, I got an appointment with his dentist the next morning. They took x-rays and determined that it's got nothing to do with his teeth. No abscess (as I figured) or anything like that. Instead, the doctor said it was some sort of lesion (probably a papilloma, he said ... which by the way he didn't think was cancerous ... okay, wait ... what????!! I hadn't even had anything like that cross my mind, but now that we've said that, holy crap! Now I've got more things streaming through my thoughts. Boy, I wish I weren't such a worrier!!). He was referring us to a periodontist to have this bump removed and biopsied.

So, I called and got an appointment with the periodontist THAT DAY, just about 2 hours later ... and because of a recent change in scheduling, he'd likely even be able to do the surgery / procedure that day! (What?! Talk about divine intervention! When can you ever get an appointment that fast??) So, I took Aus to the periodontist and things were going well ... until Austin heard he'd be getting an IV -- a shot. He's so afraid of needles. He got very nervous and hid behind me nearly crying. So, the doctor suggested that we wait a week to see if maybe this will go away by itself. (That was one of the options during the visit, but Tim and I decided we'd rather have the bump out and biopsied sooner, rather than later ... especially when the doctor said there was only about a 20% chance that this could just be some fluke thing that would go away on its own.) So, against my better judgement, we made an appointment to go back to have it checked a week later to determine if it would need to be surgically removed or not.

A week later, with the bump about doubled in size, we went back to the periodontist. Austin was trying to be the eternal optimist and told the doctor he was sure it was smaller ... I disagreed and said I was sure it had grown. The doctor agreed with me. And also determined that it was something that was to big / touchy for him to do in his office and would be more comfortable if Austin would see an oral surgeon instead. So, his office made the phone call for us ... and we had an appointment THAT DAY, about 2 hours later!! (this was particularly incredible considering that I had phoned that exact same surgeon's office the day we went to the dentist / periodontist to try and get an appointment -- because the periodontist is out-of-network for our insurance -- and they didn't have an opening for an evaluation for FOUR weeks!!!!) So, we went to the oral surgeon and he described it as a different kind of lesion or something-or-other than the other two doctors had mentioned. He also thinks that Austin won't have to be asleep for the procedure as it shouldn't be any more difficult or cumbersome than having wisdom teeth extracted. Definitely novocaine in the area (after some numbing jelly on the gum, which made Austin very happy) or possibly some laughing gas.

His appointment for surgery is Tuesday (Jan. 29th) morning. He doesn't seem nervous about it and has come to grips with the notion of having a "shot". I'm glad ... and I am happy and relieved that the procedure is only 2 days away because this "bump" is now easily four times the size it was originally, only 2 weeks ago. I'll post again soon with details about how it all went.