AIBU to keep my DCs' baby teeth?

[fairnotfair]

Been lurking for many months, but this is my first post, so I'm feeling properly solemn and a little bit scared.

Took DS1 and DS2 for dental checkups today. During pleasantries with the (reasonably hot) dentist, I mentioned that I have kept all DS1's baby teeth. Reasonably hot dentist's reaction: shock, followed by revulsion.

DS2 hasn't lost any baby teeth yet, but I fully intend to keep his as well. Is this wrong? (NB - I didn't hang on to umbilical cord stumps or positive pregnancy tests. Are teeth worse?)

its not something I did!

Blurgh thats nasty, my dc's go straight in the bin.

I kept one

I have kept the first one DS lost but not inclined to keep more.
What will you do with the full set OP? A necklace perhaps?
Not sure why dentist is repulsed seeing as he spends his entire life poking round people's gobs.

I have mine!!
In fact (and this will send some of your bleughometers off the scale) I even have the dogs baby teeth!!!

My mum has most of mine in a box. I'll probably keep the first one DS looses but not all.

harticus - maybe a charm bracelet?

1 or two....cute....eye teeth, molars etc, a little weirder

I've got a bloody pot full and don't know what to do with them! I can't bear to look in it so when their teeth fall out I just add them!

It's awful. What if one looks inside? They'll think the fairies have dumped them!

I just feel weird throwing them away!

I think of my DC's teeth rolling around the landfill....all lonely. Can't do it.

Not unreasonable no, but in fifteen years you will find them in a drawer and they will no longer seem as cute, you will just think ergh!, why on earth did I keep these?

Well I even have my (now sadly dead) dog's puppy teeth, so clearly your dentist would faint clean away at that! Am assuming a childless dentist?

It's a very widespread tradition here in Germany, and I've done it for most of their first teeth. They have one little decorative pot each. In fact, you can buy little wooden pots with the German for 'baby teeth' written on them (presumably so nobody opens them by mistake and is repulsed like the dentist above). It was only when we were staying with my aunt, and DD2's tooth fell out, aunt went to put said tooth in the bin immediately, that I realised some people react to this practice with absolute horror. She was genuinely shocked at the idea of keeping them.

OK; so I'm getting the feeling that, on balance, it's not altogether unreasonable to hang on to a baby tooth or two, but a complete set is probably excessive.

Question is: what do I do with them now? Chucking them away seems heartless - although some of them are going an unpleasant greyish colour wanders off to look up jewellery-making courses on the internet.

Thanks for the feedback!

I kept the first tooth that had grown into the mouth and the first that fell out for each DC. (In two cases those were two different teeth.) When my oldest turned 13 I looked at them, though WTF??, and binned them all. And don't regret that. When my babies were little I was sentimental and thought I was somehow losing them as they grew. I didn't lose them. (And I do still have other things that THEY as well as I find cute: the first tiny outfit worn home from hospital, say. I try to keep it to one metal box about the size of a bread box! Copies or originals of art etc go in photo albums or on walls or in bin.) Anyway, a long-winded way of saying, I understand the impulse. And teeth are tiny.

If you want to save them, soak them overnight in hydrogen peroxide to clean them first (a tip from our dentist) and store them in a way that they won't rattle, because they do break as they get old.

I found a couple of teeth lurking in my jewellery box recently. I dread to think how long they've been in there as DSs are 27 and 21 . I'm not sure which of them they belong to or what I might have done with the rest. They made me feel a bit sick tbh .

I also kept DS1's plaster cast from when he broke his arm aged 3. That was really really tiny - he couldn't believe it when I showed it to him (now he's 6ft 2 of burly rugby player).

Yes, I've kept DS's teeth.

They're in one of those mini jam jars.

I also have a lock of his baby hair and the clip from his tummy button.

Have kept DD's - not sure why but just did it automatically...
Not sure why the dentist was so horrified. My Dad was a dentist. There were all sorts of teeth rattling around our house! never felt remotely repulsed by them!

My ds is 20 and I think I've got most of his baby teeth. I'm not sure why a dentist would be revolted by that. I've also got hair clippings for the first year or so. I've got them sellotaped into the back of his baby photo album (hair not teeth). But no nail clippings, cord stumps or positive pg tests.

I have both of my DC's (now 16 and 20). DD had to have an adult tooth taken out a few months back and asked the dentist if she could have it, she has it in a box, complete with bloody big root. It's grim tbh

Do pregnancy tests 'keep'?

Or do they go a bit whiffy and minging?

No judgement if anyone has kept theirs...

:)

My DH's grandmother kept her dogs' first teeth (I know, I know) and she used them as tusks in model elephants on the mantelpiece. Just an idea for you......

(She was quite normal in other ways!)