How is teeth brushing going these days?

[katie]

Lillian absolutley hates it. We both have to hold her down to get the brush in there and it's a huge struggle with kicking, screaming, crying like I am murdering her. I know I am not doing that great of a job, I can usually get a quick once over and that's it.

I bought a book about brushing, she has seen us brush, I have given her a big brush, a little brush and an electric one to use. She just absolutely hates it.

Anyone else having a tough time still or have a magical transformation into their kid liking it?

[TrudyCampbell]

It's a major struggle for us too.

[nannerl]

Screaming, whining, wriggling, acceptance.

Pretty much the process every night. I feel your pain.

[carawestt]

He doesn't love it but he doesn't really fight us anymore either. He actually asks to brush his teeth but gets mad when we do it for him first. We have him sit on top of the toilet while we brush and then we let him do it until he's done and gives the brush back to us.

[rubber pants]

The doctor told her she has to brush her teeth and she remembers! I tell M "remember what the doctor said?!" She goes "Dr. Isaac says brush teef".

She opens wide and I scrub as fast as I can becauase she doenst let me do it for long.

[honeybee503]

She always wants to do it herself which consists of her sucking the water off the toothbrush ;/ I bought her a Bubble Guppies toothbrush so every time I tell her it's time to brush teeth she says, "buh buh buh!" It helped get her more excited about it.

[LiveLoveLearn]

Yup a struggle every night. He's happy to 'brush' himself but he doesn't do a good job so for him to let us do it is a struggle lately. The dentist said we needed to be flossing and I know we should start but I just can't figure out how to floss a 2 year old who refuses to open his mouths teeth.

[fusion]

Both my kids love it for some reason. We use the minty Earthpaste. I need to be better about flossing Anna though because her bottom teeth are super crowded.

[katie]

Yea she sucks on the toothbrush when I give it to her too. I was hoping that would help her like it a bit more. She used to be kind of ok with it when she had less teeth but now, OMG. It's like wrestling a cat.

[ktstorm]

We always brush for the length of the ABC song, and after that B gets to brush by himself. Sometimes he says no, but once I remind him that he's allowed to brush at the end he's normally ok with it. H let B brush HIS teeth once while he was brushing B's and that helped

[rubber pants]

Anyone using floride toothpaste yet? M still swallows her toothpaste so I'm not sure what to do.

[sunnysong]

We use two toothbrushes. One for me to brush his teeth and the other for him to brush his teeth (play with the water I leave running). If he doesn't open his mouth, I don't let him play with the running water and I turn it off. He can reach it because we bring his step stool in. Sometimes, he brings in other toys to play with in the running water, or audience members (stuffed animal, ken Barbie) to watch him brush. It's been working lately, but I have robe pretty quick. Sorry to the environmentalists about the running water!

[honeybee503]

Apr 16, 2014 13:34:24 GMT -5 rubber pants said:

Anyone using floride toothpaste yet? M still swallows her toothpaste so I'm not sure what to do.

I plan on asking about this when we see the pedi. She also takes fluoride drops so I don't want her to end up getting too much.

[carawestt]

Apr 16, 2014 13:34:24 GMT -5 rubber pants said:

Anyone using floride toothpaste yet? M still swallows her toothpaste so I'm not sure what to do.

We do. The non fluoride stuff wasn't cleaning his teeth well enough. I started it about a month ago? I use a teeny tiny bit (and it's enough) and I taught him how to rinse (he sucks water out of my hand) and spit.

[rubber pants]

Apr 16, 2014 13:38:22 GMT -5 carawestt said:

Apr 16, 2014 13:34:24 GMT -5 rubber pants said:

Anyone using floride toothpaste yet? M still swallows her toothpaste so I'm not sure what to do.

We do. The non fluoride stuff wasn't cleaning his teeth well enough. I started it about a month ago? I use a teeny tiny bit (and it's enough) and I taught him how to rinse (he sucks water out of my hand) and spit.

We need to make the switch.  

[carawestt]

Apr 16, 2014 13:39:03 GMT -5 rubber pants said:

Apr 16, 2014 13:38:22 GMT -5 carawestt said:

We do. The non fluoride stuff wasn't cleaning his teeth well enough. I started it about a month ago? I use a teeny tiny bit (and it's enough) and I taught him how to rinse (he sucks water out of my hand) and spit.

We need to make the switch.  

Lincoln actually likes brushing his teeth more now that we made the switch. And TBH, he probably still swallows some but I don't use enough for it to be an issue.

[Regina Philange]

He likes it!

They told me to get a motor toothbrush, because it helps speech? But he wont let me near his mouth with that thing, so we are back to the regular.

[Regina Philange]

When i tell him to spit, he makes the spit sound and basically nothing comes out. At least he is trying.

[rubber pants]

Apr 16, 2014 13:44:04 GMT -5 Regina Philange said:

When i tell him to spit, he makes the spit sound and basically nothing comes out. At least he is trying.

awwww.

Thats like when M tries to blow bubbles from the bubble wand.  She goes "ffffff" and her bangs fly up becuase she blows up.  LOL  Kids are funny.

[shevacc]

She'll brush her own teeth but hates when we try to do it. We try some nights and some nights she just does her own...she doesn't do a great job, though. The dentist told us we should be flossing her teeth since they're close together, but that seems nearly impossible.

[rileym2010]

On days he is fighting, we hold him down and tickle him.

[jamaga2583]

He does okay, he will actually brush them if I mime what he's supposed to be doing, otherwise he will brush the sink, tub, floor, walls, toilet... And then eat the toothpaste.

[ladydi]

She asks to brush her own teeth and loves her strawberry toothpaste. I let her "brush" as long as she wants to which is sometimes quite a while, then at the end I say "ok let me make sure they are clean" and she fights that and screams. We got an electric toothbrush with Hello Kitty thinking that might be more exciting and it would be able to clean them faster but she freaks out when I turn it on. I'm hoping one day it will get better.

[laurack]

It is not going well.

She loves to brush her teeth and gets excited when I give her the brush with the paste. Then she sucks the paste off and discards the brush. Then I have to brush them for her which involves pinning her down. She screams a lot.

My MIL thinks I am traumatizing her. Perhaps this is true but its either I brush them properly (and I mean like 10 seconds) OR they don't get cleaned at all.

[biblionerd]

They actually both like it fairly well. I haven't switched to fluoride though. Had no idea about that.

[ruby412]

Still a struggle for us too! I have to pretend brush every stuffed animal in the room, me, her dad and the doggie on her pajamas until she finally decides it's her turn. Sigh. Hoping this gets easier as she gets older.

[pinchofspice]

Apr 16, 2014 13:23:47 GMT -5 katie said:

Yea she sucks on the toothbrush when I give it to her too. I was hoping that would help her like it a bit more. She used to be kind of ok with it when she had less teeth but now, OMG. It's like wrestling a cat.

Yes. This.

When I try to brush she says it tickles and squirms away. We also don't use toothpaste yet. Bad mommy.

[teamhayes]

we are pretty lazy about it but he loves to brush, well he loved to eat the toothpaste

we are lucky if we brush his 4 times total a week, of which sometimes it is 4 in one day. Sometimes it is 4 days in a row.

We are working on this

[sallyowens]

E likes it. She actually really like the electric toothbrush. She brushes first and then she knows that mama/dada does it last.

[vthokie]

A is great with it, but I'm so slack in remembering. It's bad.