ds's teeth- I feel awful

[Tiredoftiredness]

Just been to the dentists and DS (4) has got to have his 2nd filling. I feel like a total failure as a parent, I couldnt believe it when he had to have a filling in his baby teeth last year and stepped up his brushing routine with an electric toothbrush and timing 2 minutes twice a day and now he needs another one!

I honestly don't understand what I'm doing wrong, he barely has sweets - maybe once or twice a week? Only has diluted fruit juice with breakfast, otherwise water or milk. Eats healthily, the only thing I've wondered about is he was born premature-not sure if this can impact? And if so, does it follow through to adult teeth?

Would really appreciate any advice or similar experiences, feel like I'm letting him down but don't understand how! Thanks for reading.

For now, I'm willing to take OP's word for it on what her kid's diet roughly looks like. The whole of MN falls apart if we don't roughly believe what people say about themselves (in absence of contrary evidence).

Before 4yo DC have had 5+ daily acid attacks, juice daily, as much fruit as I could stuff into them (2 were fruit bingers), constant snacking, dried fruit daily, erratic brushing, sweets off of older siblings, 3+ biscuits a day, my lousy genetics because my mouth is mostly fillings, no fluoride applications, no Colgate whatsoever (yuck), the cheapest toothpaste I could find, in fact.

If you believe a single word I write, that is.

i dunno mrsmorton, is it 'normal' to get fillings if you brush your kids teeth using an electric toothbrush for a full 2 mins twice a day? i am just thinking as a non dentist, that its probably not, or else all our kuds would have fillings. therefore it must be an element of bad luck wrt genetics or issue in pregnancy or just bad luck to be more 'sensitive' (whatever the word is) to sugar in diet
op sounds like she's trying hard. maybe she will have to accept her child cant get away with what other children do wrt sugar in diet, and they have to be a bit more careful.

out of interest i googled prematurity and tooth decay and it seemed to get a lot of hits. is it out of date research?

Brushing is only part of the story sanfairy, you can brush impeccably but if you have too frequent sugar exposures, you will probably get decay.

Some premature children will have teeth that were affected developmentally and are more prone to decay, most won't. My brother was both premature and had measles, he has enamel hypoplasia on his permanent teeth and no fillings. It's not a given that these things will case decay, it's only part of the picture. I'm not going to come back to the thread now as I feel the OP has had as much advice as possible via the internet and hopefully her and her dentist can come up with an excellent preventive regime.

Mrsmorton I wonder if you would join us on this thread, I would appreciate your views as a dentist, and also having experience via your brother of hypoplastic teeth. I would really value your thoughts around what your brother did in terms of diet, dental care etc to take care of his teeth
In some ways I feel better knowing that although my daughter has hypoplasia there is still a lot I can do in terms of diet etc.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/childrens_health/2330692-enamel-hypoplasia?pg=2

I have 4 kids. My eldest has autism and drinks diet coke. He can v rarely be persuaded to clean his teeth. Never had a filling. My second cleans his teeth twice a day every day and hates fizzy drinks. Never had a filling. My daughter would not clean her teeth if I didn't remind her, and misses probably 3 or 4 teethcleans a week. Never had a filling. My other son I clean his teeth for him then we use mouthwash. We use adult toothpaste. He has no fruit juice or fizzy drinks, sweets once a week on Sunday, same as the other kids. He has probably had 6 or 7 fillings in his baby teeth. Every time we go to the dentist I get asked if he easts a lot of sweets or fruit juice. He doesn't. He has the same diet as his cavity free siblings but better quality brushing done by me, and he is riddled with cavities poor kid. My sister and Mum had rubbish teeth too whereas I never had any fillings despite patchy dental hygiene. I really believe that there is a genetic component.

The first time we went to the dentist with my then 2 year old, we were asked how premature he was. (Answer, very, he was a 26 weeker). The dentist said he was 'textbook' - bits of enamel chipping off, a filling needed etc. She emailed me an article after our appointment all about the link between poor milk teeth and extreme prematurity.

I thought it was quite compelling, but I'm not a dentist.

Just a quick question mrsmorton which ppm for a 2 year old toddler please, we brush his teeth twice a day once in the morning before milk and once at night after milk.

No fillings born early at 38 weeks takes vitamin d and multi vitamins no fruit juice only milk, water or coconut juice unsweetened. He does eat fruit but if he has say grapes we give him something like cheese with it to neutralise acid

DH has terrible teeth parents didn't care, didn't brace his teeth when needed its made us very conscious of toddlers teeth etc

high you need 1000ppm for under 3's , 1450ppm for over 3.