Baby teethbrushing

My fourteen month old son used to scream bloody murder every night when we tried to brush his teeth. I am writing this post to inspire other parents who wonder if the horrendous ear splitting baby screams during teeth brushing will ever end.

He did not start out this way. He started getting teeth at about seven months and for the first few months he would let me brush them lightly with a cloth or a baby toothbrush. But along with the attitude he developed at about twelve months old he decided he did not have to tolerate this kind of invasive behavior any more. So we battled on through and tooth-brushing was literally the most difficult part of our day for a long time. But now finally it seems like the tide may have turned. However, I won't hold my breath. This could just be a phase. I know one of my husband's co-workers literally has to threaten her young children with putting them in a headlock to brush their teeth if they do not do it themselves. Things might also go downhill for us. I would not worry so much but my son has a tendency to get a visible buildup of food stuck between his bottom teeth and I do not want him to start out his life with cavities!

Here is some great advice about tooth-brushing for toddlers that do not like it (I'm guessing this represents the majority of the toddler population). This advice was passed along to me by knowledgeable parents and it has made a big difference.

1. contain that squirmy kid - try brushing teeth when they are strapped into their high-chair
2. try using that baby Orajel toothpaste that has a sort of yummy sticky sweet taste
3. use a baby toothbrush - do not use one of those rubber brushes that you stick over the end of your finger - unless you like having your fingers chomped on by very sharp toddler teeth

Use this yummy toothpaste but do not use the rubber finger brush thingy with a baby with top and bottom teeth unless you want to feel excruciating pain.

My son is still pretty cranky about the whole teeth brushing thing, but at least he doesn't wake up the whole neighborhood. He is in a good mood until I approach with the toothbrush then he throws himself forward trying to escape the highchair. Then he passively accepts his fate as I use one hand to cup his head from behind to keep him still and then use the other hand to brush his teeth.

Of course by brushing his teeth I do not mean two minutes of good solid brushing motions, or whatever it is adults are supposed to achieve. I mean about fifteen seconds of trying to make the toothbrush bristles connect with his four upper teeth and four bottom teeth while he tries to clamp his lips down to stop me. But still this is progress and now that he is no longer yelling so much I am feeling victorious.

Special diaper pails - worth the $?

Special super duty can

My home diaper disposal station

So in order to put all my cards on the table I should say up front that I never bought one of those special diaper pail/garbage cans and I am naturally pretty frugal. That said I am wondering whether anyone thinks these are worth the money?

These specialty diaper pails are not terribly expensive, maybe $20-$30, but the refill bags seem to be the real moneymakers. They charge about $6-9 for refills and I am not sure how long these refills last - also it seems like it would be a pain to have to shop for the refills.

I have always just used a normal metal garbage can for diapers lined with a basic plastic bag. In fact the same can I use downstairs for scooping the kitty litter is used for diapers. When our son was very tiny we threw all the diapers in there and took it out every few days. As he started eating solid food and the poopy diapers became stink bombs we just put small plastic bags in a basket near his changing table (the kind you get from the grocery store) and threw the nasty diapers directly in those bags and took them out every day.

Any feedback from readers? Are these special diaper pails any good?

Correlation between introduction of solid food and obesity (in formula fed babies)

So the latest article to catch my eye from the New York Times Health section reports on research which finds an increased risk of obesity in babies who are formula fed and introduced to solid food before 4 months old. Another article which discusses correlation between variables, but is going to suggest causation to millions of readers (for more discussion of this issue see my other post on spurious correlation as related to baby sleep and Autism).

This New York Times article suggests some theories for why timing of solid food could be linked to later obesity:

"It’s not clear why the timing of solid food was linked with obesity risk among the formula-fed babies in the study. It may be that mothers who use formula are less tuned in to their baby’s hunger and satiety cues. Or early feeding of solid food could be a sign of other unhealthy behaviors that influence a child’s weight. For instance, mothers who use formula and offer solid food before four months may have a tendency to use food to soothe a fussy child or be more prone to less healthful eating themselves."

This research smacks of scientific fishing to me. They had this study, Project Viva, with a wealth of data and they found correlations between three variables: formula feeding, timing of introducing solid food, and childhood obesity. I wish we could hear the scientific back story to see how they "found" this link.

Another question that I wondered when I read this article was how do these research projects define "breastfeeding" and "formula feeding". It seems like scientific literature always suggests that these are two distinct groups, even though in practice many mothers do a combination of breastfeeding and formula feeding. This frustration led me to go look up the article in the Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics and find out their methodology for distinguishing these groups. This is what they did:

"We divided children into 2 groups: breastfed, defined as children who were at least partly breastfed for at least 4 months, and formula-fed, defined as children who were never breastfed or stopped breastfeeding before the age of 4 months."

To me what this means is that many "breastfed" infants may have also been receiving an indeterminate amount of formula. For example, many mothers may breastfeed at night and send their infants to day care with formula during the day. This is just another way in which a supposedly straightforward scientific discovery gets pretty messy the more you look at it. What they were really doing is comparing purely formula fed infants with infants receiving breastmilk but perhaps also supplementing with formula.

In the process of researching this article I found a brief description of when and how to introduce solid food to babies on the American Academy of Pediatric's nifty website for parents: HealthyChildren.org.

Why do babies only bite their mamas?

About five minutes ago my son bit me extra extra hard in my armpit (ow!!!). He really likes biting me. Sometimes it happens when he is teething, but other times I think he is just doing it for fun or attention. The weird thing is he never bites his dad. What is that all about?

I have talked to several friends with babies/toddlers around my son's age and it appears to be normal for babies to bite their mamas but not their dadas (or daycare providers for that matter). Why do mamas get all the teeth marks and bruises?

I should also point out that I have a cat who never bites my husband, but does from time to time bite me. At least with the cat I am pretty sure it is because my husband is more dominant and will seriously punish him if he bites him. With my son I'm not really sure what is going on... 

By the way I do know I should try to break my son of this biting habit and believe me I am trying. The thing is when he bites me a lot of the time it is so unexpected and it is always in the most sensitive places: the inside of my thighs, the backs of my knees, or now my armpit! I tell him no and make him sit by himself for a while, but so far this has not resulted in any serious changes in behavior.

I guess I can console myself with the thought that even though I get to deal with my son's wildest side and worst crying spells, I also get the best snuggles and the most love. I think mamas get the highest highs and the lowest lows of baby behavior.

Anyway I resisted the urge to take a photo of the bruise under my arm which is now turning purple, so I am sure most readers will be happy they do not have to look at that. But if you have kids and have (or have not) experienced this "biting mama only" thing please let me know why you think this happens.

Milestone charts

Like most parents I go through times when I become worried that my son is falling behind and not meeting "milestones" like the other kids. Poor kid, who knew the rat race started so early?

Babycenter has a pretty helpful little chart that explains when certain skills develop in toddlers (13-18 months) and a couple other charts for the infants (1-6 months and 6-12 months). See all their charts here.

I like that they have divided their charts into three columns for each month:

1. Mastered Skills (most kids can do)
2. Emerging Skills (half of kids can do)
3. Advanced Skills (a few kids can do) 

I think it helpful for parents to realize that there is a lot of variation in when kids develop different skills. I am particularly hoping that my son will skip one skill that is included under 15 months "Adopts "no" as his favorite word"!

My son did not really start sitting up without support until 6 months, he did not start crawling until 10 months, and did not take steps on his own until he was 1 year. Now he is 14 months old and has just transitioned to the point where he is walking more than crawling. I was so excited for him to walk and now I am both happy and sad he is growing up so fast.

Shaken Baby Syndrome and scientific ambiguity

Today the New York Times published a story about the scientific ambiguity surrounding Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS). When a baby is hurt or killed I think it is natural for us to want to punish someone. In many cases diagnosed as SBS the caregiver denies ever shaking the baby and typically there are no witnesses to testify. Naturally many people would lie to protect themselves. So the question is how do you determine whether someone is guilty of this offense? This article questions some of the "proof" used to convict people of SBS.

What a sad article! Mainly I feel that this article exposes how terrible it is to be faced with such suffering without understanding the cause. I really think that we always want someone to blame for tragedy. Whether we are blaming a person or a gene (as in the case of genetic disease) we want to know the cause. If medical science could conclusively prove that the brain injury was the result of either SBS or some prior medical condition then we would not have this terrible uncertainty. However, it was this faith in medical science's ability to "conclusively" prove that a crime was committed that led to some terrible wrongful convictions.

Basically what this article argues is this:

1. Certain very damaging and often fatal injuries in children (brain bleeding and swelling) used to be considered incontrovertible proof of Shaken Baby Syndrome (i.e. that someone had willfully shaken the baby causing this trauma).
2. This medical evidence was used to convict people for this crime even when there was no other evidence to suggest they hurt the child (for example there were no witnesses, or confessions, etc.)
3. New scientific findings suggest that these injuries can also be the result of other previously undetected medical problems which might remain hidden until they become acute and potentially fatal.
4. As a consequence many cases in which people have been convicted of shaking a baby and causing these internal injuries are now thrown into question and several people have either been released from prison or had their cases retried and been cleared of wrongdoing.

The article points out that although it is likely that most infants with these symptoms probably are the victims of abuse, the symptoms alone should not be considered conclusive evidence. Additionally in a court the requirement that someone's guilt be proven "beyond a reasonable doubt" may be hard to establish in these types of Shaken Baby Syndrome cases. Here is a quick summary from the article:

"A dozen years ago, the medical profession held that if the triad of subdural and retinal bleeding and brain swelling was present without a fracture or bruise that would indicate, for example, that a baby had accidently fallen, abuse must have occurred through shaking. In the past decade, that consensus has begun to come undone... A small but growing number of doctors warn that there can be alternate explanations — infections or bleeding disorders, for example — for the triad of symptoms associated with shaken-baby syndrome."

Any thoughts from readers on this article? I really wonder how I would feel if it were my child.

Off topic, but in the passage I quoted is that really how you spell "accidently", I always thought it was "accidentally". Any spelling virtuosos want to weigh in on this?