Keeping teething rings clean

[melissa1215]

Silly question

My little boy has just started to cut a tooth and we've bought plenty of teething toys, but I'm not sure how to clean them?

I typically wash them under the hot tap with some anti bac washing up liq then put them in our steam steriliser and let them cool down before giving them to baby

But they aren't cold and my mum said they should be in the fridge? But how do I store them in the fridge, wouldn't that contaminate them?

I'm really anxious over germs at the minute too, we've just moved onto formula and I'm also anxious about keeping bottles clean.

Any help would be greatly appreciated xx

I used to leave them in the fridge - just placed them on kitchen roll. Same with soothers.

As for bottles, once they are sterilised just put the lids on and they are good to be used when required. Try not to get too wound up about germs. Your baby will be putting his hands in his mouth and they won't have been sterilised.

Thanks for the replies! I honesty think I've read too much on this coronavirus, my baby was very underweight (he's steadily back to a good weight now) I think I obsess over him getting poorly.

Sterilising the bottles is all new to me, but I've been doing exactly what you said so that's good!

Honestly, I washed our teething toys when we bought them but rarely do it as a matter of course. DS puts anything and everything in his mouth so it seems a bit pointless. At the moment, they're just lying on his activity mat where he discarded them earlier.

Bottles I do sterilise though - I normally do a couple at a time and make up the formula and store them in the fridge. I know that's not technically how you're supposed to do it these days but it works for us.

Same as @mynameiscalypso they lie around wherever he puts them down. My boy was prem and tiny and I was terrified of germs for months but once they’re putting literally everything in their mouth constantly there isn’t much you can do about it!

Defo focus on the bottles.

I just used to give them a rinse and pick the bits of fluff off! Honestly once you've seen them lick the buggy wheels/church hall floor/another child's snotty face it's sort of game over.

The fridge is a good place for teethers as the coolness can help - maybe wash out a plastic tub with a lid and pop them in there.

I just washed them in the sink occasionally when I was doing the washing up and put them in the sterilizer with bottles if I remembered. Babies put all sorts of disgusting things in their mouth, so unless one had literally been dropped in the toilet I didn’t worry too much about teethers

If he's cutting a tooth you'll turn to get something off the shelf in Tesco and turn back to see him chomping the supermarket trolley. Try not to worry about germs - they need to be exposed to germs to build their immune system.

I didn't sterilise anything, don't have a steriliser. I think I occasionally chucked teethers in with the washing up or rinsed them under the tap. If you're worried though just keep them in a sealed Tupperware container in the fridge.

I kept mine in a lunchbox in the fridge.

If he's teething odds are he's licking the floor, sofa, table etc. A few germs on a teether won't make one bit of difference.

As a PP said, they need germs to build their immune system.