My kids, who live far away with their mother for most of the year, spend their summer vacations with me. My son had lost three of his baby teeth prior to the summer. He lost one more this summer. I did the traditonal tooth fairy cash/tooth exchange at night, and then discarded the tooth.
My ex is now furious because I threw out the tooth. I mentioned that she hadn’t given me any instructions on what to do with his teeth. She felt that it was obvious that I should have at least held onto it. I felt it was obvious to toss the tooth. Why take the chance that my son finds the tooth and begins a premature investigation on why the tooth fairy doesn’t want his teeth? Plus, the tooth is not exactly aesthetically-pleasing. She wanted to save all of both kids’ teeth, for some unknown future use. Unfortunately, she will be one tooth short. Oh well.
This got me thinking: how many adults actually know where their baby teeth are?
I think my Mum may have kept some of mine - probably not the full set. But I don’t attach any value to them and would probably toss my own kid’s teeth. What are you keeping them for? That was rhetorical, by the way - obviously some people think it’s nice to do so.
I lost mine about 45 years ago, so I don’t know where they are. I doubt my mother would have saved any of them, especially since I was the third child.
I kept one each of my kids’ teeth and have them wrapped in paper in my jewelry box. I’ll probably throw them away sooner or later. Like you said, they’re not much to look at.
As far as I know, my Dad kept all of mine, may be missing one or two, but he has the vast majority, it was a bit of an obesession with him and I have wondered if he is going to make a little baby headhunter necklace out of them someday.
Thank you for reminding me - I have my son’s tooth in my wallet. It came out at football practice the other day and I have to stick it in the “collection”. I have all of his teeth in a little bag in my jewelry box.
When he lost his first one, we were at my parents’ house. He was super excited about it and about the tooth fairy’s impending visit. My dad went and pulled out a little box that had all of my teeth in it. I thought it was interesting that my son didn’t question why my dad had all of my teeth and not the tooth fairy.
I’m pretty sure my dad has all of them. And my sister’s. And I think his mother’s wisdom teeth. You know what’s gross? Apparently if they get dried out enough they split in half.
My dad’s not ghoulish - he’s just a packrat (he’s better than his dad though).
My mom has a little box inside her jewelry box. She threw all the teeth in there. She doesn’t know which are mine and which are my sister’s. We’ve never needed them. I don’t think she’d have a problem tossing them if she needed that cubic inch of space for something else.
Just one. It was discarded without medical-type waste by a dentist when it cracked in half…I was a college sophomore at the time. Unfortunately for me, the reason it lasted until I was 19 is that I inherited a genetic fluke that means no adult tooth ever formed there to push it out.
My mom had an “add-a-tooth” necklace made from all mine and my siblings’ teeth. I think there’s a couple of our dog’s teeth on it along with one of my dad’s permanent teeth that had to be pulled for a crown. She got tired of it and sold it on ebay recently.
For some reason the very thought of the subject of the OP is giving me the willies. People hoarding children’s teeth seems really ghoulish. shudder
But I have no idea where mine are. It’s not inconceivable that parents held onto them. Last year my parents presented me and my siblings with folders full of mementos of our childhoods. Report cards, class pictures, things like that. They were toothless.
I’m not sure where mine are. My parents kept them all, along with the little notes I’d written the tooth fairy, but my dad gave them all to me about 10 years ago, and I might have thrown them away or something.
My grandma took two of my dad’s baby teeth and had them made into gold earrings shaped like hatchets, with a baby tooth acting as the blade. I have them now, but I don’t wear them. I just keep them as a curiosity.
I do have all my kids’ baby teeth, bagged in a jewelry box. I don’t know why I keep them. They’re part of my babies, I guess. I have a few kitten baby teeth too. And hair from first haircuts. It’s just sentimental. I had no idea it was considered ghoulish. Ghoulish to me is Victorian hair jewelry.
I imagine all but one of mine are at the local garbage dump.
The other one I swallowed. It probably made a bid for freedom via the sanitation system, but I guess there’s an outside chance that it’s still lurking somewhere in my belly (very, very, very outside… I don’t think digestive acids are good for teeth).
I have a keepsake set for my daughter that has a space for “My first curl” and “My first tooth”. If I keep a tooth it will be to fill that. Otherwise I would say I’m highly unlikely to keep her teeth unless I take up voodoo between now and when she starts losing them.
I think my mom finally got rid of ours. She used to keep them in a small silver box inside her jewelry box.
I have no idea where the Kiddo’s teeth got to. He lost his first tooth being thrown from a horse and we never found it. I imagine it’s still somewhere out in that pasture.
I was never very good at getting the tooth out from under the pillow so I told my kids if you left a note for the tooth fairy and asked very nicely she would let you keep it.
I kept them in a tiny music box on my dresser until my teenage daughter found them and dragged her brothers into my room for an intervention. They made me throw them all away.