Our new little three-and-a-half month old trickster is teething…we think. EVERYTHING he encounters is surreptitiously thrown into his beautiful little maw to masticate into oblivion. Doesn’t matter if it’s my knuckles, the dogs tail, a frozen waffle or one of his actual teething toys - he chews, grinds, gnashes, and munches until we take it away. We’ve only recently started putting a bib on him as we discovered he’s probably losing a percentage of his body weight in drool each time he does this.
We got this teething sac thingthat we put ice, frozen string beans, or frozen carrots into and he seems to like it…but the other day he nearly ripped it in two so…may have to change tactic.
What about the pain? I’m sure oragel is good, but is bourbon better? According to Grampa Gene it is…but GG’s nose is redder than rudolph’s so that may not be the best thing either…
Go with baby Orajel. Lay off the bourbon, or drink it yourself.
A dose of Tylenol is helpful, too.
You’re gonna hear a LOT of old wives’ tales. Here’s one I put a lot of faith in, because it seemed TRUE in every way. I had a doctor tell me it was baloney, but the facts lined up for me.
You’ve noticed the increase in drooling. You’ll probably see little sores, or breakouts on Baby’s chin. The old wives’ tale says that the drool actually changes for teething, that it now has an enzyme in it to “tenderize” the gums to help the teeth break through.
Babies OFTEN get accompanying diarrhea when teething. And a lovely, hard-to-manage diaper rash to go with it. Again, this is attributed to the enzyme in the saliva.
Go easy on mopping up the drool on the chin. Think of how SORE your nose gets when it runs like a faucet! Clean Baby’s chin often, DRY it completely, and then coat with a dab of Vaseline to protect that soft baby skin.
When cleaning up those nasty diapers, do the same thing: clean the area EXTRA well (you need to remove that enzyme!) DRY the skin completely, and then give the butt a liberal slathering of Vaseline.
Bottom line (pun intended): Nobody in the house will be happy right now.
~VOW
I used a solid teething ring which went in the fridge, and a [Sofie the Giraffe](http://sophiegiraffeusa. com/), which was great as it has long legs which can be chewed on instead of fingers.
But reading your description, it doesn’t sound like teething as much as the baby is just starting to explore the world in a new way - by putting everything in their mouth. Unless it interferes with sleeping or feeding, I wouldn’t worry too much about it - just watch what goes in the mouth for things which could be dangerous.
Boy, I’m glad my baby production days are OVER. No more OTC cold remedies, no more Orajel, my granddaughter was forbidden a pacifier until she turns 18…
Baby Orajel is great for teething, especially at bedtime. We also would give a bit of baby ibuprofen when things got real bad. Save the bourbon for yourselves. You’ll need it.
Don’t worry about the drool, just give him a good, absorbent bib. 3 1/2 months is a little early for teething,[sup]1[/sup] it’s more likely, he’s just exploring the world using all his senses. The mouth is very sensitive, and he can really explore different textures with that tongue.
Every child is different, some teeth more easily than others, When Fang started teething, our first alert was him trying to injure Mrs Magill while she was breast feeding. The boy got weaned real quick. Spike and Squeaky made sure we knew they were teething. Both from the crying[sup]2[/sup], and the teething poops.[sup]3[/sup].
I’m glsd for threads like this. The Baby-amnesia is getting close to setting in, and threads like this remind me of how many Roger Murtaugh moments I had with Squeaky.[sup]4[/sup].
1 - That’s not to say he’s definitely not teething, some kids have been know to be born with teeth.
2 - That’s what the Baby Orajel and bourbon are for.
3 - Especially Spike, some of what that boy had in his pants would seriously make you question the existence of a kind and loving god.
4 - Sitting in a rocking chair at 3 am with a crying infant muttering, “I’m too old for this shit.”
Junior had his front two fully cut through by 4 months - now at 16 months he has pretty well all his molars, along with everything else.
We use the distraction technique and if that doesn’t work, we give him Baby Tylenol. He sleeps, we sleep, he’s not in pain anymore, we’re all happy.
Hylands Teething Tablets are homeopathic and so have no actual active ingredients, but I’ve had lots of friends tell me they worked well for their child - placebo effect maybe? I do know that when Junior is climbing the walls in pain just pulling the Tylenol bottle out seems to calm him down a bit.
Good luck - we should be done with the tooth issue by two with the way things are going; however, I’ve heard later teeth tend to be stronger, so we’ll see.
We have relied on refrigerated teethers, baby tylenol and ibuprofen, and an amber teething necklace. We have avoided the teething tablets (contain belladonna; there was a large recall on them a year or two ago) and orajel. We got our teething necklace here if you are interested: Hazelwood & Baltic Amber Teething Jewelry. Now, at nearly 15 months old, she will bring the necklace to me to put on her. I don’t know if she just likes wearing it or if she can tell it makes her feel better.
My late mother in law bought it for my son Jason (now 41) and rubbed it on his gums to quell the pain of teething.
It’s a fargin’ LAXATIVE.
D and I kept wondering why in the world our son kept having watery stools. He was dehydrating.
And yeah, we bought belladonna-containing products (can’t recall the trade name just now) after we found out about the laxative, but it was taken off the market, due to drug abuse.
I know this doesn’t help to answer your question, but I just wanted to add my two cents worth regarding Jason and his teething problems and what we did for him.
Yep. Mine’s just two months younger and has been pretty much constantly teething since about three months. He’s cutting all four canines right now, which will bring him up to 16 teeth at 14 months. He’s doing pretty well with the teething now but those first half dozen teeth were difficult. We relied on Tylenol when he seemed very uncomfortable but mostly he just chewed on his toys or whatever. Damp baby washcloths. Towels. Whatever.
Don’t count on it being teething. My daughter began to drool and chew at three months, also, but didn’t cut her first tooth until nine months. Which was last week, thank you very much. You think that kid is fussy and drooly now? BOY HOWDY JUST YOU WAIT BUSTER.
Sorry. She’s also had a feverish cold since then. And so have I. It’s been the worst week of my life. Anyhoo:
She didn’t get the teething fussies until we could actually feel the tooth through her gum. It took it a few more days to cut, then. So see if you can feel anything, if not, assume it’s run of the mill “being three months old” and keep a supply of dry bibs on hand.
Long story short, do not waste your money on anything “homeopathic”. At best, they’re useless. At worst, if they aren’t diluted enough to be useless, they might cause harm.
Baby Advil, too. It lasts longer and seems to work faster than Tylenol. When our start teething we now, as experienced parents, pull out the damn drugs.
TomKitten started chewing and drooling at three months, and didn’t cut his first blasted tooth until he was almost one. Little bugger. He’ll be two in March, and still has a grand total of nine teeth.
My son didn’t have a dry chin 'til he was 3, I swear to Og.
If his chin gets red and irritated, you can smear on a little Desitin or A&D Ointment. If you smear it into the shape of a goatee, you have to take pics, though, and link to them.
I developed a “Vaseline when we go out, Desitin when we stay in,” routine. Vaseline protects from moisture, but it doesn’t have anything in it to heal irritated skin. Desitin and A&D do (zinc oxide), but have the unfortunate trait of being opaque white.
We swore by Hyland’s Teething Tablets, too. They were magic for my kid when he was teething. I thought they took them off of the shelves a couple of years ago - are they back? They were brilliant - they also melted immediately, so there was no choking hazard. Hyland’s also makes earache tablets, and I used those as an adult at times when I had an ear infection - they worked on my pain, too!
I also have friends who swear by the teething necklaces - when we have our next one, we’ll definitely be giving those a shot - pretty sure they’re the amber ones.
Also, just a frozen washcloth helped a lot - we let him chew on it, and that helped until it thawed too much. We always kept two or three in the freezer for him.
Good luck - and congrats on your new little one! I have been away from the Dope longer than I thought!
What bothers me about the teething tablets–and I did give Mimi a few while she was cutting this tooth–is that they obviously ARE effective. No matter how dilute those things are, they’re still potent enough to be effective and therefore, because they aren’t regulated by the FDA, I’m scared of them. I threw the bottle out when Mimi sat quietly through a three-hour car ride after taking two of them.
