Teeth cleaning for 18 month old - utter nightmare

[TheChicOfIt]

Every time I try to clean his teeth he clamps his mouth shut and wriggles about, thrashing his head from side to side. It is a nightmare and the only way I can get them done is to strap him into his old car seat, sit behind and hold his arms against his body while I force the brush into his mouth. He always ends up screaming, which is good as I can then do the teeth, but I am worried that he is going to associate his teeth being cleaned with this horrible experience. I have let him try to do it himself but he needs them done by me really.
Any tips greatly appreciated .

I pinched an idea from here about 18 months ago when my DD was about 20 months and tricky when it came to teeth cleaning. We play hunt the animals... we've caught giraffes, bears, lions, tigers, monkeys before graduating on to antelopes ; all with associated noises and actions. Has worked a treat - infact we even went seasonal over Christmas and hunted for Rudolph whilst singing Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer. I wish I could remember who it was who suggested it - I'd thank them heartily!

DD2 who is now 18 months and, whilst not a screamer, likes to clamp down on the brush as soon as you put it in her mouth, seems to be responding more to a transport based approach . As in - here comes the plane/ train/ ferry with associated actions and noises. I am a loon.

I know kids can be difficult but....god - that sounds pretty horrific! You do have my sympathy and i mean this kindly but I do think this has got a bit out of proportion! Take a deep breath, let go of the clean teeth thing and then relax. I'd give him the brush to play with for a while, like a few weeks, and then work out a game to play with him with rewards for cleaning teeth when he has had a chance to forget the tooth torture.

Hi TCOI, Happy New Year!
You are self-aware & concerned for your son's wellbeing (both physical & psychological) which is great.
It's a nightmare scenario for sure since you have to do it at least twice a day & I'll bet you've come to dread the whole ordeal (which it sounds like it is for both of you).
I had that exact same problem with my DS, now 2 1/4, for quite a while so ~I'm speaking from experience.
It's stressful & draining but I found the more frustrated I got & the more cross I was acting the worse it was.
The turning point was when I found a toothbrush for his age group which has a little racing car on the handle just near the head part so it looks like the car is driving into the child's mouth! I think it's Macleans, I get them at Superdrug for less than £1 each & stock up as often they run out & only have girly panda ones! Then I made a big thing of showing it to him, telling him this is his own special 'mouth car' & revving it up ready to go ('into the tunnel & over all the bumpy rocks' lol). I carry on the sound effects theoughout if necessary but to be honest now he's used to it it usually only takes the initial revving to get him to open up!
Another thing I did was to buy kiddie toothpaste in a couple of different flavours & always give him the choice of which one he wants to use.
I do insist that I get a chance to brush them properly but as eventually you want him to be doing it himself make a point of offering him the chance to have a go either before or after you (this also gives a feeling of compromise).
That way he'll feel a bit more in control & involved rather than having it 'done to him' IYKWIM, which I think is crucial at this pivotal age when they want to start being independent but can't always pull it off.
Hope this helps!
xxx

I think I've said this before on another thread about this - what I did was use my dd's favourite toy (dolly, at the time), held the doll's hands round the toothbrush handle, and said that dolly was going to help brush her teeth - and she cooperated immediately! We now have various toys at different times helping to do the toothbrushing, which can make holding the brush a bit awkward for me (!) but it's better than fighting and it gets them done!

Thank you for all your replies.
Rereading the post it does sound horrific, but I am a nice mummy honest - it's just this particular thing he hates.
Good point MamaTama about the toothpaste - I may need to try another one, as initially he will open his mouth, but as soon as the brush hits his teeth or gums he clamps down. I'm using the Milk Teeth one, which is quite minty.
I've tried giving him the brush so he can "brush" my teeth, which he thinks is fun.
At the moment I am only brushing them in the morning - I don't think I could bear to let him go weeks without being brushed correctly - that may sound a bit anal but I just don't want him to have any of his little baby teeth decaying.

I think you need to change your toothpaste? Mine cries to brush more Drags me to the bathroom to brush his teeth!! I am sure its the toothpaste. Has a nice bubble gum flavor! Oral-B, winnie the pooh one.

And of course Barney helped me to introduce him to toothbrush way beore he started brushing with the "Brushing" song . So I sing the song for him everyday while I brush his teeth!

I am sounding looney too

we did "this is the way we brush our teeth" (here we go round the mulberry bush), i would brush my teeth at the same time and would let her give mine a little scrub (although beware of toothbrush getting rammed down your throat) and i would do hers, if all else failed i resorted to a headlock and a 10second scrub. She is nearly three now and very good about letting me brush her teeth so don't think the headlock scarred her psychologically

ps i did ask dentist for advice and he said most important thing at that age was it becoming a habit and a quick 10 second scrub was prob as good as it would get

My DD is 17mths and thankfully took to teeth cleaning really well.

We started off just letting her play with the brush and encouraging her to put it in her mouth. For a while it was just chomping on it!
Either DH or I will brush our teeth at the the same time so she watches us and has picked up the idea of actually brushing now.

I let her have the brush for a few minutes then say its mummys turn and she lets me have a quick brush. She only has 3 teeth so it doesnt take long!!
We chat about getting the food off her teeth ( whatever she has just eaten) making them shiney.
Then make a big fuss of her when shes co-operated.

We use the Milk teeth one too but I have fond memories of using a lovely strawberry tasting one when I was a kid.

My DD is 21 months and got her teeth early, so we've been brushing (or at least trying to) for awhile. Initially, I just let her gnaw on the baby toothbrush for awhile and finished by doing a quick brush of her teeth myself. As she's become more independent, she no longer likes me to do it for her.

What I've found works best is to brush my teeth with her. She copies me (for a few seconds at least), we swap toothbrushes, she brushes my teeth, I brush hers, she gets to put more toothpaste on both our brushes, etc.

I try to keep it as relaxed as possible and don't worry too much if she has only brushed for a few seconds or missed some teeth. I'm hoping that what she loses in vigourous brushing today will be made up for if she enjoys the habit of taking care of her teeth!

dd2 was an absolute nightmare as a toddler til about 2.5

I'm afraid it routinely became a 2-man pin-down restraint job

NOTHING else worked, nothing

She came out of it and is great at brushing now. You have to pick your battles, but teeth for me is a big one. Poor little thing

I used a sock puppet to hold the brush & chat to dd, also hunt the animal works.
Buy a child's electric brush, let him have a go with it as any extra brushing is a bonus but I wouldn't go the restraint route, think it probably makes for a bigger battle in the long run.

I would say restraint is the last option, naturally

But there were frequent occasions when NOTHING would persuade/encourage/jolly along dd2 to let us brush her teeth, or even let HER brush her teeth herself

And it WAS a battle, but one I insisted on winning... I wasn't going to end up with her with rotten teeth

We use the Oral B Winnie the Poo paste and I can confirm that it tastes yummy

With Ds, we ask him to show us his teeth and make big "Wow!!" type noises and tell him what a big mouth he has etc while brushing...seems to work.

I have resorted to the headlock in the past too and have also had two brushes for a while - his one he could chew and mine which was kept for brushing while he was busy playing with his brush.

My DD (now 23 months) was exactly the same. Whenever I asked friends what they did, they all said their children were fine with it, which didn't help. I tried bribing and games and even forcing her to in the same sort of way. It was a battle every night. I was so terrified of her getting rotten teeth. Then I realised that it was the battle that she was resisting so I stopped trying too hard and gradually she relaxed about it and is now quite happy to have her teeth brushed. It felt like that would never happen but it did and it is now a lovely part of our bed time routine. Good luck.

Hi again!
You can get lovely natural mandarin orange & fennel ones from the health food shop which taste gorgeous & have no harmful ingredients so it doesn;t matter if he ends up swallowing some of it.

PS The car brush is actually by Colgate.

my father is a dentist and he says that babies should be given a piece of cheese for their supper as it neutralises all the sugars on the teeth and protects them. i have heard this from many dentists too. unfortunately my ds is dairy allergic so we do the head lock method too!

what we found works is by spotting everything that he has eaten in his teeth, like'ooh there's some mushroom, and a bit of rice etc'