How a Mercury Filling Almost Took Our Son’s Life
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A Mercury Filling almost took my son’s life.
Here’s what happened with the filling and how my advocating for our son likely saved his life.
There are some stories about our family’s health that I tell on occasion to share about what we’ve been learning.
Recently I thought that I should share some of these “stories” with all of you so that you can learn more about what we’ve been through.
Before I start, keep in mind that I used to be someone who never thought twice about
- drinking non-filtered water
- eating lots of sugar
- using a microwave
- getting immunizations
Like all those things I mentioned above, I never thought twice about getting mercury fillings either. I mean, why would I have thought that my friendly family dentist put something into my body that would actually hurt me?
Ahem. Think again.
Our Mercury Fillings
Since I completely trusted our dentists, and since the mercury fillings were a lot cheaper than the alternative (and we were not raking in the dough at the time when our oldest needed fillings, and he needed a lot of them), we always got the silver ones.
One particular time, after he got not just one mercury filling, but two mercury fillings, he kept complaining that one hurt. I kept reassuring him that nothing was wrong, but he kept complaining and complaining.
After a while, I started worrying.
I then remembered stepping into the room when he was getting the fillings put in and seeing quite a bit of blood. I wasn’t sure, but I didn’t recall ever seeing a whole lot of blood from fillings before, but then my fillings were always quite superficial and I only had two in my whole life until after I got Lyme disease. But the blood thing continued to bother me.
So I took him in to have the dentist look at it, but the dentist found nothing wrong. I think we even went in twice for reassurance.
The Nightmare Begins
A few weeks later, our son woke up saying that his tooth hurt a lot and his cheek was swollen. That afternoon he laid down for a nap around 2 pm and slept ’til 5, which was very odd for him.
When I woke him up (so he’d actually sleep that night), the nightmare began.
Half of his face was swollen down to his jawbone and up around his eye. His eye was almost swollen shut.
I called the doctor and they sent me right over to the hospital.
Now I knew something was wrong.
Our son was admitted immediately. His swelling was cellulitis, a potentially life-threatening infection of the soft tissues. Since it was around his eye it was dangerously close to his brain.
Not words a mama wants to hear.
The doctor started IV antibiotics, but our son got worse. When I saw my son the next day (Dad stayed in the hospital with him because his younger brother was just a baby and I was home with him), half of his face looked like the Elephant Man’s.
24 hours after being admitted there was talk about him being sent to Infectious Disease because the infection wasn’t responding.
“No!” I screamed silently.
I drove back and forth from the hospital, getting whole foods and clothing for my son. Crying, praying, and singing Psalm 23 from the Psalter…
“Yea, though I walk through death’s dark vale…yet will I fear no ill….”
Finally, just before they were ready to send him on to the next set of specialists, things started turning around a lot. And we went home with a lot of antibiotics and my son finished them.
Nightmare Round 2
Then, about a week later, my son told me that his mouth felt funny.
I looked in his mouth, and there it was. A small swollen spot just above the filling.
I was VERY scared and made an appointment with our doctor.
The Doctor Who Wouldn’t Listen to Me
Doctor thinks mom is crazy and that the swelling will go away on its own.
MD: “It’s not just above the filling” he said.
Me: “Yes, it is.”
MD: “No, it isn’t.”
Me: “Yes, it is.” At this point, I was getting angry and frustrated that he wasn’t listening to my mother’s instincts. Couldn’t he see it? Didn’t he know what we’d just been through?
MD: “What’s it going to take to make you happy, Adrienne?”
Me: “A referral to an oral surgeon.”
And finally, I got the referral and went to see not one, but THREE oral surgeons.
Their recommendations were each different, including:
- Outpatient surgery
- Biopsy
- The third, most experienced doctor said, “I’m just going to pull the tooth.”
I went with the third, since it was the least invasive and least expensive.
The tooth was pulled and the most well-respected oral surgeon in our city said,
“Yes, it (the problem) was just above the filling and I’ve never seen anything like it in my life.”
The “it” was a granuloma.
What’s a granuloma?
Well, I didn’t know either, but here’s what it is. According to Wikipedia:
Granuloma is a medical term for a tiny collection of immune cells known as macrophages. Granulomas form when the immune system attempts to wall off substances that it perceives as foreign but is unable to eliminate.
Initially, I thought that my son’s body appeared to be attempting to wall off the mercury filling. However, after sharing this post, two readers commented that the dentist might have created the problem by perforating the root canal and exposing it to bacteria that then wasn’t addressed.
Either way, this was a complete disaster and the dentist did nothing to alert me to anything that had gone wrong, and the doctor wasn’t willing to listen to me.
Regardless, stay aware and vigilant about your and your family’s health.
Tooth removed. Granuloma gone.
No more swelling.
Takeaways
1. Don’t assume that others’ stories of “invisible health issues” or sensitivities are invalid or “all in their head.” I used to think so. Now that a number of them have come to roost in my own household, I know otherwise.
2. Mercury is a poison. I recommend not putting mercury fillings in your mouth as a permanent structure. I’m not saying this is for sure what caused the cellulitis, but I don’t want it in my body or in the body of those in my family.
3. You are the parent. You are in charge of your child’s health. I knew something was wrong with my son and though I was ridiculed by his physician, I pressed on. He might have died otherwise. Guess who isn’t our physician any longer? I sent the resulting medical results to him and didn’t even get a reply. Not good.
4. Don’t take the lives of your loved ones for granted. Things could have turned for us on a dime that day. For now, we are all still together. Thank God.
More “Natural Health” Posts
– Natural Autism Healing and the Best Therapy of All
– Natural Autism Healing – Monster Included
– Help! I Can’t Get to Sleep – Natural Help for Children (& Adults)
– Do You Have Adrenal Fatigue? Take This Quick Test
– How we avoided antibiotics – the pink stuff
– Why I’m Thankful for – Autism
Do you or your children still get mercury fillings?
Thank you for your story. I’m about to see oral surgeon, I have granuloma around my root canal/crown. There is no mercury though. My root canal with inserted titanium post wasn’t done correctly about 20 years ago. After all these years! The root wasn’t filled completely, my body reacted with infection. I felt my whole cheek under my eye in pain, and got a lump size of almond right above my tooth on my gums. Before seeing a doctor I used lemon oil and lavender oil rinses since lavender is good on infections. All pain went away after 2 days, so I actually didn’t go to the doctor then. 5 months later at my regular checkup and cleaning, dentist looked at xrays and said it’s out of his league and is sending me to a specialist, but he said that personally he would leave this alone. Infection is gone since I have no pain, he sees nothing new going wrong and granuloma is a way of body to isolate infections. Body has done the job, granuloma isn’t increasing etc… Unless it gets bigger he wouldn’t mess with it. Options for me: surgery: opening my whole cheek!!!! scraping stuff out etc… EEEEK! Option #2 removing the tooth with root and all. Then I have a big gap (it’s not too far back and wouldn’t be good to have). With a gap I can do 3 crowns: 2 neighboring teeth plus gap so it’s called a bridge. I don’t like it because crowns are supposed to harbor bacteria and are not good to have. I’d rather have fewer crowns. Another option with more $$ is implant. I’d opt for that because there are fewer crevices for bacteria to grow, fewer crowns on neighboring teeth. Or…. leave it alone. My point is that granuloma can form on any infection not necessary mercury filling. I’m totally with you about mercury: not putting it in child’s mouth or anybody’s mouth, but granuloma formed not because of mercury. It’s just might be coincidence that it happened on the same tooth. Same with bleeding. The whole event might have been just the same have you put in the white filling. When I read I thought you are going to write about some mercury poisoning of your son’s blood etc…
I actually think the alternative explanation- that the granuloma was a reaction to a particle of amalgam from the placement of the filling is the most plausible. Mercury toxicity is more likely to be a systemic, whole body type reaction. A granuloma is exactly what would occur if a piece of amalgam got lodged into soft tissue during placement of the filling and the body reacted to it. This is pretty likely, given the fact that you said there was blood during placement- an opportunity for a piece of amalgam to become incorporated into soft tissue. I think this explanation (which you did acknowledge at the very end) is not only plausible, but far more likely than mercury toxicity. I’m not in favor of amalgam fillings, but I don’t think this reaction can be blamed on the mercury, it should be blamed on the traumatic placement.
Adrienne, I believe this and actually did my thesis for my clinic class in clooege on this very thing in 2006. The professor said she had never heard of such a thing and didn’t think was true, but in England they notified all medical organizations and the ADA about this finding and they told them it was more dangerous to have the fillings taken out than to leave them in and they weren’t going to make it mandatory for dentists to put the notice up in their offices, so the public doesn’t know this, thank you for making it known.
Interesting. But my son’s issues came from getting the filling – are you asserting that you would recommend not removing them as well? Thanks!
Since I was a child, my family has not done silver fillings, and I still will not do them for my kids because of this risk. Many people have told me they are “completely safe.” However, I don’t believe it. I had a cousin nearly die from her mercury-filled silver fillings, and she continues to have health problems to this day. (I remember there even being a TV news story on her when it happened, so serious was the reaction.) It angers me that the dental insurance company will pay for the silver, but not for the porcelain fillings. However, we just switched to a new dentist who no longer uses silver fillings, and even though the cost for porcelain is higher, it is worth the peace of mind that they aren’t going to be leaching poison into or systems should we need them.
Thank you for sharing your story.
You’re welcome. Thanks for sharing. I am suprised that you say that the insurance won’t pay. I think all of them do (I used to be in insurance) but the cost of the white filling is just more…??
You are correct about the insurance. How I worded it didn’t come out clearly–what I should have said, is that the insurance company will only pay the amount the silver fillings would cost, and the additional cost beyond that for the porcelain is the responsibility of the patient. I think it was about $30-35 more per filling. My previous dentist said that if it were for a front tooth, they might have covered it, since that is visible, but for a back teeth, like the molars I have mine on, it is considered “cosmetic” and “unnecessary” for porcelain to be used.
One thing about amalgam fillings that I have not seen mentioned here is the fact that they EXPAND over time. All my old amalgams were causing my teeth to crack. Even my non-holistic dentist wanted to remove them because of this reason. So if they expand and cause your teeth to crack, how in the world can you say that absolutely no mercury is leaching out of those puppies?
My holistic dentist is also opposed to sealants. We COULD get sealants without BPA but they release fluoride. How nice. Anyway, my dentist says there is no way to ensure that the tooth is completely clean when the sealants are placed. So you could possibly be sealing a dirty tooth that bacteria can eat away at unimpeded. I’ll take my chances with good diet and oral hygiene.
Ugh. Thanks for sharing, Erin. I didn’t know sealants contain fluoride?????? Wow.
Dental fillings are used to restore teeth and treat tooth decay. Modern dental amalgam(metal alloy) or silver fillings are durable, cheap and low in mercury. Some people should not use amalgam fillings including pregnant and breastfeeding women, children and people with kidney disease. Alternative tooth-coloured filling materials have become more common and affordable.
This is in Australia – goes on to say the alternative tooth-coloured fillings are becoming more cheaper and therefore more people are getting them due to worries about mercury.
Also do you really need a referral to visit the dentist?
I needed a referral to an oral surgeon. The oral surgeon deals with issues like bones, teeth in bones, etc that are beyond the normal capabilities of a dentist. Their practices fall under the medical part of our insurance coverage in the U.S.
yet those people don’t know what the white fillings are made of (its plastic) and if they leach chemicals. and they don’t have the time tested track record as silver fillings. perhaps in 20 years everyone will be switching back to silver?
Hi there, Mr. Sprat. I am happy to have you comment, but I would appreciate it very much if you would not hide behind a fictitious name. I have asked my dentist to tell me in the ingredients in the fillings and you can also have a sensitivity test for your own body for things you are considering putting in your mouth. I suspect that few things would be more risky than mercury, however.
When I was pregnant with our 3rd baby at 15 weeks in utero she had a very fast heart rate, over 200 beats a minute (normal is 120-160). My mid-wife sent me to a Perinatologist who was no help at all (what did I expect?!?!). My kinesiologist was very helpful and I believe that he is responsible for bringing the baby’s heart rate into a more normal range during my pregnancy. However, at 35 weeks our precious baby was stillborn. We went to our kinesiologist and upon some testing he believed that mercury poisoning was the problem. Mercury crosses the placental barrier.
After that I had my 3 fillings replaced at a holistic dentist (he really sucked and cost a lot so it was a bad experience). I’ve since gone to a “normal” dentist that I love and he’s replaced all the fillings the holistic dentist had done (because they all fell out!). I did do chelation after my mercury fillings were gone and I totally recommend that. It took a while but all of a sudden I had alot more energy. Then I got pregnant again…and again with no problems 😉
Everyone needs to get their fillings replaced. It’s not a big deal and a regular dentist can do it no problem. I wish I had known.
Wow. Sorry you had to go through all of that. There is good protocol to follow and sometimes I think it might make sense to wait (like for kids, or until you have someone who knows what he is doing), but for sure it makes sense to look into it. Thanks for sharing.
a kinesiologist knows nothing about blood work, hearts, mercury poisoning, etc. he is someone who studied movement … basically, he’s a gym teacher, sports kinda guy. and he likely only has a bachelor degree. your comments make no sense. why would you entrust him with your babies heart? one can of tuna has more mercury than a couple fillings would leach in a decade. there is an undo hysteria on this subject matter.
Hi again, “Mr. Sprat”. Again, I am going to have to ask that if you continue to make insulting comments towards me or my readers that you not try to hide behind a fake name. I did the calculations on a can of tuna and a mercury filling and I found that actually it is more of an issue than you might think, if my calculations are correct. I got information about how much mercury is released from amalgams. I am taking my calculations from here and I assumed b/t 1.7 and 17 micrograms per day release of mercury from amalgams.
Then I took the tuna information from here assuming the .427 ppm (an amount in the middle of the list to give a fair estimate). According to my calculations, if there is .427 ppm mercury in a can of tuna, then there is 48.4209854975 micrograms of mercury in a 4 oz can of tuna. So, you are completely wrong about there being more mercury in a can of tuna than a couple of fillings would leach in a decade. Perhaps you need to recheck your math. Thanks!
Wow, that was quite a nightmare.
hi adrienne,
A couple resources about holistic dentistry.
Rami Nagel has written a book called Cure Tooth Decay which provides a protocol for healing and preventing decay, based on the research mainly of Weston Price as well as a few others. It i a fascinating read. I am currently following this protocol, but my tooth problems mau be related to other health issues and I’m trying to fix a lot at once, hopefully it will work. For gum care, there is a company called Orawellness that has a ton of info online and some great products I am using. I am basically trying to tackle this issue from the inside as well as the outsde. If you do ditch flouride, be aware that most of the natural toothpastes are based on glyceribe, which prevents tooth remineralization. Tooth soap is good, baking soda based mixes are good; there is a calcium based recipe on the wellness mama blog that looks good too.
That holistic dentist in your area sounds ridiculous. Stay away! We have a great one who is mercury free, works with a local nd when fillings are removed. They are accepting on my deision to use no flouride and try to deal with my mouth naturally
Michelle.
Thanks for the info. I too tried Nagel’s book, but I couldn’t stomach the marrow. I also emailed him for help and honestly was completely put off by his dismissive response. I was really discouraging to me as I emailed him at a very difficult time in my life, I ended up going the deeper healing route with Nutritional Balancing, which might interest you.
It’s interesting you mention Orawellness – I bought their product as well and am very impressed and am going to do a review and giveaway for them. Also, I saw that recipe from Wellness Mama and am planning on making it. My issue is that I have exposed roots in some areas so I am really concerned about whether or not I need fluoride there. I don’t want any decay.
I am not sure which holistic dentist you are referring to. The dentist in my post was not holistic – he was mainstream. But I have been to a local holistic dentist, who, in my opinion, is no good. I have been so frustrated with care on both sides of the fence – mainstream and alternative. It has been really hard to find someone who really works with you and isn’t just trying to make (several) bucks. :). Take care.
Wonderful wonderful blog, Adrienne.
Thank you.
You’re too kind. Thanks.