Tooth brushing

[Brela]

Hello,

I was just wondering what everyone has done about brushing teeth once they emerge?

My baby is 10 months old and she has 4 teeth.
I brush them twice a day but she hardly lets me do anything so I give her the toothbrush and she chews it and sucks it for about a minute then throws it to the floor.

Also my bedtime routine is that I give her milk before bed in her room and she gets sleepy.
I brush her teeth before that and then in the morning.
I'm
Dreading doing teeth after milk as it will really wake her up.
Also do I need to force to brush her teeth? A few people I know force tooth brushing and their babies get a bit distressed and cry.
Is this the way I should be doing it? Will my babies teeth rot the way I'm doing it now?

Thank you so much!

Xx

I had issues brushing my sons teeth for a long time but I never forced it. Personally I thought that would cause more harm than good. He's now 3 and very good at brushing them and will let me do them properly after too.

My advice would be to tweak your bedtime routine though as not brushing after the milk won't be good on the teeth long term.

During the earlier days my son just chewed on the brush a lot and I'd get the odd brush where I could and dentists were always happy with that and just said to keep trying. One other thing I did (as my son was quite a heavy sleeper) was brush when he was asleep sometimes so not sure if that would be an option? There are lots of teeth brushing songs you can try as they get older. Good luck!

Thanks Natalie!
When did you start doing teeth after milk? For some reason I'm finding this so hard to do as I feel like bedtime will be awful if I do!
I know it's just something to get used to so I just need to do it!
Thanks

Our routine was always teeth after milk right before bed then would do a story in an attempt to wind down instead

We didn't do teeth after bottle until around 14 months when the bed time bottle went.

We slowly cut the bottle down and now it's a cup after shower, then teeth and story whilst in cot.

Thank you! I will start to try to change the routine in the next few months xx