What do you do about night time biting?

[itsonlysubterfuge]

My daughter is 10 months old. Everytime she gets a new tooth, she likes to bite for a little while and then it normally stops, until the next tooth arrives. However this time is worse. She's got four teeth, working on eight, both her other top and bottom teeth are coming in. I know during the day if she bites me I just put her down and stop breastfeeding, but what about night time? When I'm putting her to sleep and she bites me and I stop breastfeeding she just gets really upset. It's very disruptive to stop breastfeeding. And what about the middle of the night when if I don't feed her she screams? She goes from waking up upset, to meltdown very quickly in the middle of the night. Also, do you normally do the same thing if the biting is on accident, rather than on purpose?

Today was the first time she's bit me and didn't want to let go, so I pushed her nose into the breast and she thought that was hiliarious. S
he just opened her mouth to breath, while laughing and continuing to bite. When I put her down she didn't really care, just went to play with her toys. I really hope this biting thing ends soon. She's also starting to experiment biting other people/places like cheeks and shoulders. I don't know if this makes a difference or not.

Any advice would be good.

[cathan]

Sounds to me as if she's getting into a very unpleasant habit which you need to put a stop to right now. Biting you is awful and if she thinks it's funny and starts biting other children, she will be VERY unpopular at mother and toddler groups etc in the future. You need to be totally firm whatever time of day or night - if she gets upset when you take her off the breast and cries, then let her be upset. Tell her firmly "no biting" and then let her feed again. Repeat this process until she stops biting. She has to learn that biting is NEVER acceptable and teething is no excuse. My DD never bit me so when my DS did I was completely shocked and reacted instinctively by taking him off the breast, shouting "no" and putting him down. He screamed, of course, and was very upset but never tried it again! By not being absolutely assertive about this you will give your daughter the impression that it's all right and make the problem worse - which is awful for you and will be bad for her in the long run. Hope this helps.

[itsonlysubterfuge]

I have tried saying no firmly and putting her down. I have also tried being silent. Tried laying down and also tried keeping her hands busy. I've tried a lot of things. I am very firm with her and she still finds it either funny or upsetting. When she gets upset it doesn't stop her from biting me again. Most of the time when she bites me and I put her down with a firm "No, we don't bite Mummy", or the silent treatment, she just plays with her toys and doesn't really care that the nursing has stopped. At night though she gets very upset. I might call up the health visitor and see if she can visit and suggest anything.