Toddler not a fan of teeth brushing

[RealLifeIsForWimps]

My son is 16mo and has a lot of teeth, including some of his molars. The problem I have is that he will not let me brush his teeth for more than a couple of seconds, and definitely no proper brushing of the molars- he just clamps his mouth shut. He'll chew the handle of the toothbrush but that's about it. If I try with toothpaste he just eats the toothpaste and then rejects the toothbrush. I've tried letting him do it himself (even though I know I'm meant to do it) but he'll only do it for a few seconds.

I'm trying not to make a big deal out of it as I don't want him to get angsty about it/ get a toothbrush phobia, but I admit I am stressing about tooth decay. I only give him milk or water to drink and he doesn't eat much sugar (mainly fruit), but I know he still needs to brush.

Any tips?? Are there any magic toothbrushes/methods that will suddenly transform him or do I just need to be patient?

Just as an aside, I live overseas and am about to go to bed, but will come back to the thread in the morning, so sorry if I don't reply immediately- just wanted to catch the UK evening traffic.

DS aged 2 used to be very resistant but is fine now. I used to let him chew the toothbrush while I brushed my teeth, then I'd pretend to brush his teddy bear's teeth, then attempt to brush his.

No tips but watching with interest. I've got the same problem with my toddler. He loves the toothbrush but only to suck the toothpaste off. Any sort of brushing is unacceptable as far as he's concerned.

oooh! I've got the same problem (sorry, not very helpful, I know, OP!) My DD is 18 months and I can just about brush the front teeth but nothing else.... Does anyone have any tips?

My DD is a teeth cleaning resistor too.
We use a chewable toothbrush in addition to regular toothbrushing and let DD chew it herself to try to get the back teeth cleaned a bit better.

You can get rubber toothbrush things - I used to let DS chew after a meal. Plus a bit of cheese post meal is supposed to be good.

As for brushing - try in front of a mirror and brush yours together. Perhaps brush in the bath for a distraction? With DS we had phases
Of non compliance and that usually worked. As he got older, I say "let's brush the x/y/z foodstuff off" and he lets me (he's 2.3).

Variety of things sometimes work here - I give him the tootthbrush with toothpaste to try brushing first, then let him brush my teeth - he is usually so slackjawed with joy that I can get in there. Sometimes just saying "Now Mummy's turn" is enough. Also let him brush teeth of toy or grinning character in book / magazine. Sometimes I let him play witha forbidden item, like my makeup collection, so he doesn't notice me brushing his teeth. Tooth brushing song - "[Ds] loves to brush his teeth, brush his teeth, dum de dum."

In Scotland they have a national toothbrushing program (for obvious reasons!) And I have learnt loads from the dental nurses at ds sessions. Starting toothbrushing early is about getting fluride onto the teeth (all 2 yr olds get it painted on their teeth as well here) plus setting up the habit for life, rather than being a chore their parents MADE them do that they will drop as soon as they get independent. So don't make it a horrid experience.

Also its not just about how much sugar but keeping it to limited bursts eg meals only rather than sugar / acid attack all day so the teeth never have time to recover. Ie don't let them snack on raisins, biscuits, sugary yogurts but keep it for after dinner. And don't brush their teeth straight after food as the enamel is actually weakest then.

My son is 15m was the same pre-christmas, however his genious granny found waybuloo toothpaste!! He has the sparkliest teeth in the west now, we have to stop him brushing them 5 times a day. Try his favourite character as a bribe?

Thanks. Lots of good suggestions and seems like maybe it's something they get more accepting of as they move towards 2. I'll also try getting him to brush my teeth/toy's teeth.

I am a bit paranoid because my teeth aren't very strong (despite good brushing/flossing nearly all my molars are filled/crowned) so I'm worried DS might inherit them.

Witty Tried the character thing. If Tigger wont persuade him to brush his teeth, no-one can

Iggly He doesn't like cheese. Really annoying. he'll eat most other things but not cheese for some reason.

I do have a chewable toothbrush but he's not that interested in chewing it, although will chew the end of the normal toothbrush.

This really depends on how far you can trust his aim, but this worked for me. I put toothpaste on both our brushes and let him clean mine (which he loved), then I cleaned his i.e. I'd clean his back teeth, then he'd clean mine and so on. He enjoyed instructing me to "Open wide!" etc.

You can try doing it together in front of the mirror. I found this worked for DD.

Now I give her DH's shaving mirror and she gets it down while sitting in the bath.

YouTube, Crawford the Cat and Dog & Hippo brushing their teeth - works amazingly well for us.

I used to find that toddler dd would often get an outbreak of tiny elephants scampering all over her teeth at around bedtime. Sometimes dinosaurs. We used to have great fun with me chasing them around with a toothbrush and scrubbing them off ("Oh no! There's another one! Quick let me gettit! PHEW! Oh NO! There's a couple down the front!! Hold still!" etc etc)

She also used to thoroughly enjoy my running commentary of what she had eaten that day; "Now let me see... goodness ME! Have you been eating sweeties today? I can tell, look there's a whole wheelbarrow full just parked behind this tooth, let me scrub that out of here... Oh hang on - what's this roast donkey doing back here? Have you been eating roast donkey? No? Well I can't see how else you would have a whole roast donkey lodged in your teeth. I think you must have been sneakily eating roast donkeys while I wasn't looking. Let's scrub THAT out of here... There's some weetabix down the front here... did you eat weetabix for breakfast today? Ahh well that explains it." etc etc and she'd be amazed that I somehow knew exactly what she'd eaten all day just from brushing her teeth (never occurred to her that it was me who gave her everything she had eaten in the first place ).

Any silliness to keep her attention off the fact that she's having her teeth brushed ("Are these your teeth? They don't look like your teeth. Are you sure you haven't accidentally worn Daddy's teeth today? Can you prove it? I'm not convinced...")

And then after brushing I would ask her to smile and would be theatrically blinded by the intense brightness of her nice clean teeth.

All sounds like a bit of a pantomime written down - but it was just a fun 4 minute part of bedtime routine that she loved.

I can only use one make of toothbrush for DS (he's now 2 and 2months). It took me ages to work out why he went through phases of letting me brush his teeth and total refusal. I let him brush his teeth during the day, then do a quick once over. Usually i brush mine at the same time and we then swap so he brushes mine whilst I quickly do his. In the evenings it's DH or me who do a proper brush then he gets to play with the brush a while. That's non-negotiable, and there have been tears. But I have awful teeth and am desperate for him not to.

SilentBoob - you sound so fun! You can come and brush your teeth at our house any day!

Yeah, I want to hire Silent Boob for daily teeth brushing!!

My son was pretty wriggly with brushing and would chew on the handle etc until one day I started naming each tooth after beloved family members/pets/characters - 'this is Uncle Mark's tooth, that needs a good clean, now it's Lily's one, and next Postman Pat's'. Thankfully it worked and after a few weeks he would have them brushed without the running commentary.

Me and DD brush ours together too. We face each other and play little mice for the front teeth by going sqeak sqeak and lions to do the back Roaarr! She is 18 months.

I think at this age all they are supposed to do is chew on the toothbrush anyway. these teeth are going to fall out no matter how well you brush them!

To encourage DS to brush I showed him how I brush my teeth which helped a bit. To get him to chew/brush for longer we made up a "brushing song" - all I do is pick a tune and make up words to it and as long as I'm singing he'll keep brushing, our favourite one was to the tune of Rappers Delight - "I said a brush, brush, brush and you don't stop brushing to the brush brush brushing to the rhythm of the brushing beat"

Like TerrysNo2 I have to sing a 'brushing song' to DD (2.1)

Ours is hokey-cokey (or hokey-pokey if you're in the states )
"You put the toothbrush in,
To get them nice and clean,
In, out, in, out,
You brush them all about"
Etc

Silentboob- I tried your elephant thing and it worked a treat. I told her the toothpaste shrinks them. I hope I don't raise a seriously screwed up child but at least she'll have lovely teeth!

Thanks!

SilentBoob had a lovely solution and obviously has patience.

I took another approach and showed my dd pictures from an internet search of 'rotten teeth'. Ooh some scary stuff out there. I didn't show her the really awful ones but a couple of pictures is all it took to be rid of toothbrush torment twice a day.

Have been reading all of your tips with great interest & ! Dd is only just 15 months but already has 16 teeth so I have my work cut out. I'd say I'm still dealing with the issue rather than having totally solved it but things that have helped are brushing her teeth in front of the mirror (she has to stand in the sink whilst I hold her to do this!) letting her brush my teeth/ daddy's teeth. Singing whatever crazy song comes into my head and changing the words to brushing & scrubbing, god knows what my neighbours think. I wouldn't say it was the most through brushing but allows me to get around her mouth pretty well before she gets too annoyed. I didn't think if the thing about raisins though & how sugary they must be

SILENTBOOB you sound AMAZING!! full of brilliant fun ideas to distract kids from things they don't like doing..brilliant!! great tips, thankyou.