Teeth cleaning

[RHR]

Hi ladies, I need some help or advise please.

My dd has 5 teeth and I'm having problems with cleaning her teeth. As in she won't let me at all.

She gets excited about me getting her tooth brush ready for her. I sit her down on my lap and let her have a play with it and I try and help her clean her teeth, but she either has a screaming tantrum or manages to wriggle off my lap and run away.

I've tried letting her help me clean my teeth so that she can start to understand what's happening. I'm running out of idea's on what to do and don't want to get to the point of pinning her down to do them and scare her.

Any help would be much appreciated. She's nearly 13months as well.

 

[isil]

I used to tickle my son. It's really hard though! When she gets a little older get her to say 'aaaah' and 'eeee' with you, that works well with my LO

 

[Racheldigger]

I don't know if this helps, but with Rowan, I started by only doing her teeth last thing at night, when she was really sleepy. I didn't do it in the bathroom, but brought the toothbrush and a beaker of water through into the bedroom, and after we'd had our night-night feed and bedtime story, I cleaned her teeth as she sat on my knee, usually half asleep: she just chewed sleepily on the toothbrush. It's possible that this only works if you breastfeed to sleep, though.

 

[lisa9999]

Sophie refuses in the mornings so I always have a bit of a fight with her, but in the evening, she always lets me brush them when she is in the bath, and then I let her have the toothbrush after and she chews on it for a while.

 

[GemBaxter]

I gave Ben a toothbrush to "teeth" with. We used to sit and play with it with no paste or water on it and he would chomp on it.

Now he is a little older we have the fight that he wants to do it not me. As long as he has had his teeth checked by us before bed I don't mind letting him attempt it alone in the morning.

xxx

 

[BabyJ'sMummy]

For ages I just let Rhys get on with it and do it himself, he's been to the dentist twice and his teeth are fine but now that the back ones are coming in the dentist said I should do those ones for him. If she just has her front ones do you think you could just let her do it herself for a while?? Remarkably Rhys does let me do his back ones now, I don't think he would have if it had been a couple of months ago, and then I give the brush to him to finish them

 

[labydird]

With kids brushing is not as important as what they are actually eating. Just make sure he is eating well, limit sugary salty foods. when my kids were very young I would give them a toothbrush to play with so they could explore and get used to havig it in their mouth by themselves (this went o for a few weeks before brushing). start with no toothpaste, just let them dip it in water and brush to get used to it.

 

[Siyren]

i would say lyssa's teeth only get brushed properly once, maybe twice a week, we jsut do our best without making it a battle, and when she's old enough, say 2 and a half or 3, we'll start giving her a sticker for brushing her teeth herself and then letting either me or OH finish brushing them x

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

I'm afraid we just hold her down and do it, we let her do it first and give her the opportunity for us to finish off the job with her sitting willingly, but she rarely chooses this, so we have to hold her down. She loves dried fruit which is very sticky and also OH and I are both very concerned about teeth in general, my own always having been looked after meticulously and being perfect, and OH on the opposite end of the spectrum having extensive very painful work done, and not wanting that to ever happen to Ruby.

 

[RHR]

Thanks Ladies for the advice. Isabelle usually ends up chewing her tooth brush on one side of her mouth, typically the side that has fewer teeth. I'm just paranoid I think about them going bad which I don't want obviously, like all you others.

Argh, it's so hard to know what to do sometimes.

 

[DebzD]

When I asked my dentist about brushing DD's teeth, she said that if she got the toothpaste moving around in her mouth then that was a really good start and to not worry too much if it took a while for the actual brushing to become an accepted part of the routine.

 

[RHR]

Thanks Debzd. We'll get there eventually with some sort of proper attempt at cleaning her teeth. I just hope it doesn't take forever.

Last time I saw my dentist I did ask about how to clean them and he said just to use a tooth brush. well duh. I know that, that advice doesn't help when your lo won't sit still.

 

[cherryglitter]

i brush jakes teeth very lightly and then let him chew on the brush (costs me a lot in brushes!!)

he gets excited about it now as i think he likes the taste of toothpaste! bless him.

 

[kate.m.]

I always pass the brush to Travis when im doing my own: i sit on the loo (with the seat down!!! not actually on the loo!) and he sits on the floor in the bathroom & i brush my teeth in a really exagerated way, with a definate sawing motion for him to see. He used to just chew the toothbrush, but this last week he has started to copy me & im confident that he's gonna pick it up quite quickly now. Hopefully he wont get the back ones in for a while yet & when he does i'll just show him how to do that himself too.