The dentist and cavities

Shelby recently went for her first dentist appt. Who discovered she had 5 cavities, all in her molors. She has had 4 filled now and one more to go. They will only fill certain areas at a time so that they aren't overwhelmed. So we have had 2 appts and one to go. A lot of people have asked me WHY are they filling baby teeth. For one thing they are in her molars and molars don't fall out typically until age 12-13 or so. Between now and then the cavities could get way worse and cause her lots of pain and you do not want to pull baby teeth out before they are ready. As they are holding a spot for the permanent teeth and if you pull them too early the teeth could shift around and really mess up the spacing for the permanent teeth to come through. I have been told it is common for kids to have cavities in their molars, since there are a lot of crevices and spots for food to get trapped. They used gas to relax her when they did the fillings and we are going to a pediatric dentist, so they have all kinds of tricks to make the visit not so traumatic. I was amazed at how well Shelby did, much better than most adults I know! Such a big girl. You would never even know anything was wrong with her! Right afterwards she told me it bothered her, which is was still numb so I think it just felt weird. I gave her motrin right afterwards and she never said anything again! Amazing how small children handle things like this so much better than adults! Hopefully this will be the last fillings for a long time. We have started using flouride toothpaste (I thought she was too young for this, but apparently not, as they told us it was necessary at this age, even if they don't spit that great). They also suggested using flouride water and/or flouride supplements to promote her healthy permanent teeth which are already there, just under the gums (which we seen on the xrays, pretty cool). We have a well for water so our water does not have flouride and I was buying jugged water. I am now getting some city water from family to use for our drinking water.