You Can Call Me Hal

For at least a year now, Michael had been sporting an amazing new super power: Extreme Bad Breath.

And he’s fully aware of this fact, because he takes great pleasure in turning around and blasting me with it whenever I hold him up close by my face.

If I happen to catch a whiff of it, it’s impossible not to react.

“Whoa, Michael! Your breath reeks!” I say, rearing back and turning away from his fetid blast.

Then he quickly turns toward me, grins and huffs out a big stinky cloud right at my nose. “Haaaaaaaaaaa!”

It’s all I can do not to keel over. I swear, this stuff is really horrific. His halitosis could peel paint, set off the smoke alarm and make the cat retch.

We’ve tried everything to combat it. His nightly dental care routine went from mere tooth-brushing and flossing to include tongue brushing and gargling with Listerine. But in the morning, his breath is entirely putrid.

It had his mom and me stymied. What could produce such a malodorous maw? Could it be something he’s eating? Unless he’s chowing down on baby dragon scat, I don’t see how. Lord knows he doesn’t like cheese (let alone limburger), and he’s hard pressed to even drink milk so it’s not likely to be dairy-related. He doesn’t eat boiled cabbage or pickled beets. I don’t stock the cupboard with cans of anchovies, nor have I ever noticed any durians in the fruit bowl.

He’s got nothing up his nose. Well, not any more, anyway; that’s one area we check fairly regularly for Play-doh, cheerios, money, marbles, cat food, socks, neighbors, etc.

The one thing that did concern us was his gargantuan tonsils. His tonsils have been rather massive for some time. Given his history of ear infections, tubes and adenoid removal, I’d almost say he had some kind of chronic infection. Strep maybe? No, there are no white spots, and he’s had bad breath even while on antibiotics and under his regular pediatrician’s watchful eye. He doesn’t ever complain of a sore throat, and his dentist says his oral hygiene is A-OK.

But in spite of it all, every morning this sweet little blue eyed angel wakes up, rubs the sleep from his eyes and then exhales the devil’s own snort upon me. I was seriously contemplating the purchase of a gas mask.

Just last week he had to go to the pediatrician for his four-year-old checkup and some immunization shots. Aha! A perfect chance to ask about his tonsils and his buzzard breath.

Substitute doctor was in today. Her diagnosis: allergies.

Allergies? Yes, allergies. Probably to dust mites. These are the microscopic buggers that are perfectly at home in your home, eating dead skin cells and whatever other detritus they can find. And they poop out allergens.

So, how it is that an allergy can cause bad breath? In an allergic reaction, your sinuses swell and can trap junk that festers and stinks, creating really stinky breath. Brushing and gargling and whatnot won’t help, because the problem is up in the nasal area, not in the, uh, mouthal or throatal.

So, the doc gave us a prescription for Nasonex to help counteract the allergic reaction, and a saline rinse to irrigate the turbinates in his nasal cavity to get rid of the festering junk.

“What about his humungous tonsils?”

“hmmm…” she said, thoughtfully, peering at his throat with the otoscope. “I’ve seen bigger.”

She explained that they can be swollen like that for lots of reasons, but if he’s not complaining of a sort throat and he doesn’t have a fever, there’s no need to worry. He’ll grow into them, basically. She’s in the “don’t remove the tonsils” camp, in which I happen to reside as well. “Nurse them back to health,” she said. “They’re part of your immune system.”

Doc did stress that we need to take care of the dust mites, though, since they’re going to keep creating allergens. She recommended covering his mattress and pillow (no problem), taking down the shade and putting up blinds (problem: we just put up a shade because Michael kept destroying the blinds), eliminating as many stuffed animals as possible (another problem, since Michael likes the abundant plush menagerie inhabiting his bed at night), and vacuum every other day (vacuum… hmmm…yeah… uh, that’s like, work, and stuff. Will have to think about that.).

Well… at least we covered his mattress and pillow and washed his linens. And vacuumed. Okay… his mom did all that.

Now, after only a few days of cleaner digs and treatment with the nasal spray and rinse, Michael’s breath is sweet and clean again. The problem is solved! Allergies. Whoda thunk it?

So we’ll keep giving him the allergy treatments, and try to be more enthusiastic about vacuuming and washing his linens. Hopefully once the dust mite population has been controlled and Michael has grown a bit more we can ramp down on the medicine.

Good to know that modern medicine had the answer! I just wish I’d found this out before I bought ten cans of baby dragon repellant.