Complicated

I suppose if you stop and think about it for a minute...she is. Its just that...we've been with her for the surgeries, the infections, the failures, the successes, the ups, the downs, the good days and the bad. We are her mom and dad...she's our little girl...so its not that complicated. Really its not.

I've lost count of the number of times we've been turned away because someone...somewhere...at some hospital...or some office...has been afraid of her. It makes me want to yell..."Seriously! Your too afraid to do what it is that you've been trained to do? Too afraid to help us? To help her?"

It gets exhausting. It really does. I just need a team of people surrounding us who see her as a little girl and not a complication waiting to happen before it even does. I need people to step up, be brave, because God knows we are being brave bringing her to you, and just help.

Ash needs dental care. Imagine for just a moment if you lacked a vital organ, and since you lacked that organ, the stomach acids, digestive juices, and bile produced inside of your body backed up into your stomach every minute of every day causing it to creep up your esophagus causing you to vomit this fluid out. It coats your teeth all day long and erodes the enamel and basically eats at them constantly. Imagine how it might feel to have this taking place in your mouth. On your teeth.

Now...Think about that feeling, that really clean feeling you get after you've just brushed your teeth. If feels sooooooo good! Imagine NEVER being able to have that feeling inside of your mouth. NEVER.

Ashley's medical status is complicated. When you mix her medical fragile status with her mental status you have a recipe for disaster when trying to find a dentist willing to step up and do something as basic as clean her teeth for us. We need a dentist willing to work with an anesthesiologist who is willing to put her to sleep. Its called sedation dentistry and its done every single day around this town. EXCEPT...no one will do it for Ash.

I'm sad. I'm frustrated. I'm even a little angry. I'm sooooo tired of it being "too complicated."

Insurance says we have providers in network in this town that are certified to do the procedures we need done...what they don't say is HOW to get them to AGREE to do them. Really? UGH!!!

Ashley's mouth is an infection waiting to happen. Dental care is vital at this point and we've got to get it figured out. I swear I'm not willing to lose her to an infection caused by a bad tooth. Not after watching her fight so hard against all the odds.

I don't view her as complicated. I just see her as Ash. Its time that somebody in the dental field saw her the same way!