brushing teeth HELP

[KristinCB]

ok.. i'm at a loss. this is a daily battle and i'm at my wits ends..

lucas DESPISES getting his teeth brushed.. like we have to hold him down screaming everyday to get them done.. and its never done as well as it should because its so hard

any tips and suggestions would be appreciated. this is something we can work on with his OT but until we can go see her again just wondering if anyone has an idea..

we let him pick out his own toothbrush etc so just :/

[rach3975]

Lots of sympathy! Two of my kids hated having their teeth brushed. I remember getting tips from our therapists for Ben, but nothing helped that much. He's 5 now and it's still hard to get them done as well as they should be, but at least we're well past the age where it was a huge battle. I hope you get there soon! In the meantime, is there anything you can distract him with, like a toy he doesn't usually get to play with that he can only use during teeth brushing?

[farrijc]

Would he have any interest in an electric/Spinbrush instead of a regular toothbrush?

[Megan Turnidge]

Ugh. I feel your pain!! Allie HATES getting her teeth brushed and I hate doing it because she runs away, refuses to open her jaw, bites down on the brush so I can't move it, cries... it really irritates me!

[AmyM]

Wish I could help. My daughter just turned 10 and I still have to tell her all the time to brush her teeth. I don't know why she hates doing it.
We went through the screaming stage. The threat of a trip to the dentist might just make mom brushing those teeth not so bad after all

[mdb21]

My son was the same way - it was such a battle to brush his teeth. And while it was a last resort and I probably shouldn't have done it, I sat him down and told him that if he didn't brush his teeth at least twice a day, that worms, bugs, and spiders would start crawling around in his mouth. He's terrified of any type of insect, so it worked. Amazingly well, actually. The teeth-brushing ritual has gotten sooo much less stressful. On the one hand, I feel like a bad Mom, but on the other hand, sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do.

[AmyM]

Originally Posted by mdb21

My son was the same way - it was such a battle to brush his teeth. And while it was a last resort and I probably shouldn't have done it, I sat him down and told him that if he didn't brush his teeth at least twice a day, that worms, bugs, and spiders would start crawling around in his mouth. He's terrified of any type of insect, so it worked. Amazingly well, actually. The teeth-brushing ritual has gotten sooo much less stressful. On the one hand, I feel like a bad Mom, but on the other hand, sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do.

Hahaha! Would have loved to been a fly on the wall and heard that. Hey, nobody got hurt and it worked. Sounds good to me.

[Leah]

Well we still have to remind all of them constantly and they never want to, but they've been to the dentist, some more than others and it's not a fun trip. So brush, or dentist (sometimes it's both). LOL

[Teresa]

Well...Ella's 2 and it's been a struggle, but we're getting better by using lots of teeth brushing songs and brushing in the bathtub (she doesn't spit yet, just uses the safe to swallow paste).

Songs like this one by Raffi:

When you wake up in the morning
and it's quarter to one,
And you want to have a little fun,

CHORUS:
You brush your teeth, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch,
You brush your teeth, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, ch.

When you wake up in the morning
and it's quarter to two,
And you don't know what to do,

(CHORUS)

When you wake up in the morning
and it's quarter to three,
You've got a great big smile for me,

(CHORUS)

When you wake up in the morning
and it's quarter to four,
You hear a great big knock on the door,

(CHORUS)

When you wake up in the morning
and it's quarter to five,
You're so happy to be alive,

(CHORUS)

And more here: http://www.hummingbirded.com/dental-week.html

[Kjersti]

Oh my gosh....I remember having to wrap one of my girls in a towel so I could try to brush her teeth each day. Ahhhhh!

Now we have a cute little sticker chart. It seems to work well.

[scrapperjade]

To get Avalynne to open her mouth, we make the sounds with her. When I need her to open her mouth wide, I tell her to say "Ahhhhhh", and then I'll do it with her... lots of times DH does it too, so we're all sitting there goint "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" for like a minute, haha! Then I tell her to show me her pretty smile and say "Eeeeeeeeeeee" like a monkey! And then she insists we do it too, so the 3 of us sit there and say "Eeeeeeeeeeeee" all together, hahaha.

I'm sure we look like fools, but she thinks it's hilarious, lol. So far we haven't had too many teeth brushing wars (although we've had a few, and they are such a power struggle!!)

[Tracie Stroud]

We've had a huge battle with this with Noah. He has autism and sensory issues. We've pretty much had to hold him down for a couple of years now. He has just recently wanted to do it himself, so what we did is let him hold the toothbrush himself. He did that for about a week, then he wanted to start putting it in his own mouth. Then we moved to him 'brushing' his teeth himself, and now he lets us do it without too much fuss. Honestly his teeth didn't get as clean as we would have liked during this transition for a couple of weeks, but it's made a huge difference and now he lets us really clean them. I hope you can find something that works!

[Tracie Stroud]

Oh and letting him watch Kaitlyn brush her teeth helped too. He looks up to her a lot and when he saw that she wasn't afraid of it, it helped.

[cbettua]

We bought a toothbrush that blinks for a minute. It helps but we still battle with my 15 month old. I just don;t think he understands

[Lauramarie]

This may not sound like a good answer but it's just my two cents to things I am learning right now about the struggles with our children and simple tasks.
Children do as we do and say what we say. So maybe make tooth brushing a family event. Everyone grab their toothbrush and toothpaste and brush to some fun music. Keep this up until he wants to try it. At some point, he will want to join the fun right?

[Jenn Barrette]

My kids will do a quick brush on their own, but I go in and do a little better job. When I go in, I tell them I see animals in their mouth...ya its strange but it works. "Oh my, how did you miss this zebra back there?" LOL They get a kick out of it.

[MamaBee]

With my son... it was a matter of doing it together. He wants to do everything Daddy does... so, after watching Daddy do it, he was more than happy to do it... so now when he wants to brush his teeth, I get my toothbrush out and we brush together... and also getting him Thomas the Train toothpaste (fluoride free - we are moving away from fluoride in this house) has been huge - now he wants to brush his teeth 5 times a day if he could. Not sure what will happen when the Thomas toothpaste is gone... we will be switching to Xylitol based toothpaste.