pocket of pus on 4yo cheek/gums???

[Vaquitita]

my 4yo DD was complaining about her mouth/teeth hurting. today i took a look at it, and i can see a pocket of white pus (it's firm and sore to the touch) along the side of her gum, in the valley where her gums meet her cheek. i'm not really sure what's up, her teeth don't hurt and look fine. any idea what this is? how concerned should i be?

[Mooney]

Is it covered over, swollen up round like a boil?  Or is it a flat patch of white with irregular borders and the surrounding area a little red/swollen?  If it is the latter, it could be thrush, a yeast infection.  There will be lots of ideas about how to treat it in the breastfeeding area (tea tree oil, gentian violet, vinegar, cutting out sugar...)

[Alisse]

It's probably a good idea to go see a dentist as it could be an abscessed tooth that's draining.  Baby teeth are bizarre when it comes to pain in that they are often asymptomatic even when there's a big problem.

[Vaquitita]

when researching, i found this:  http://www.curetoothdecay.com/Tooth_abscess.htm  and began trying several of the suggestions. I cut sugar and grains out completely (for the first few days, they have snuck back in a little the last day or two due to a party), i dug the CLO and BO out of my fridge and began giving her it again, also made sure she was eating lots of butter, liver, eggs, meat. i cut back her fruit consumption too. Topical treatments: I had her do warm salt water swishes, coconut oil swishes (she could only last 2 minutes at a time), and i put clove powder on it (she hated that!). I did these 2x a day.

after 1 day it was getting smaller, so we kept it up. the last 2-3 days we haven't really done any of the topical treatments and it's not healing as fast as it was, but it's almost gone. she has no more pain, and now that i can get a good look at her teeth, everything looks ok. i wonder if she scratched her cheek and it got infected somehow? since i wouldn't do a root canal anyway, i think i'm just going to keep up the nutrition therapy and skip taking her to the dentist.