I have a confession to make. I am a potty mouth. Yep, yes I am. I rotted Garren’s teeth out when he was a baby. At 16 months old he had to be put under general anesthesia and have fillings put in his four top teeth.
Why?
Because I got the brilliant idea to clean his pacifier with my own mouth a couple times when he was a baby. I am not a koolaid mom I swear! This child was nursed and had NO sugar or sweets of any kind. Didn’t matter. The bacteria was in his mouth waiting for his little teeth to show up.
You can say, well on occasion I’ve put the handle of the pacifier in my mouth, but never the nipple, doesn’t matter. Little babies LOVE to grab at that pacifier handle and then stick their fingers in their mouths. I’ve also taken a bit of their food with their spoon to encourage them to eat. DUMB! DUMB! DUMB!
Why didn’t anyone tell me this? I realize you shouldn’t kiss all over baby when you’re sick because you don’t want to give them a cold, but no one told me about this bacteria called strep mutans. I wasn’t sick. I didn’t have anything to worry about. UGH! So wrong.
One of his teeth wound up getting an abscess when he was two and had to be removed. For those of you who’ve had children have medical procedures, you know how horrible it is when they administer that medicine that makes your child’s eyes roll back in his head and knock him unconscious. It’s awful. This all could have been prevented with a little knowledge.
I was even a dental assistant and didn’t have this kind of information. In fact, a lot of dentists don’t even realize this. I remember the reproving looks I got from the dentists who were oh, so, certain I was giving my child Coca Cola in his bottle. I finally found out what was wrong when we moved to Jacksonville and got my child a pedi dentist who had a state of the art facility and was current with his dental knowledge.
I suppose the snotty attitude I got from the dentists was karma. I remember being smug knowing I would do a better job with my child, even though I had no children yet, as I saw my nephew’s front teeth rot out. I had no proof that she fed her child unhealthy foods, but she must have right? Or was she just not brushing his teeth? What a jerk I was. In hindsight I remember she fed her child extremely healthy foods, better than I do my own kids now. I also remember watching her chew her food for her baby and giving it to him. Before you get all grossed out, she’s from another country and their ideas on things might be different than ours. That was most likely where his dental problems came from. Her mouth, her bacteria.
Now granted, this doesn’t happen to everyone, I’m just lucky. We don’t have this bacteria when we’re born. I’m pretty sure I got it making out with Bobby in between classes my freshman year. Even though it doesn’t happen to everyone, I still don’t understand why they don’t tell you this at the hospital with all that other crap they tell you after you have a baby. It’s such a simple, preventable thing. Now whenever I see a mom kiss their baby on the mouth, I cringe. That’s a shame.
Here’s a little article about it for further clarification.
http://parenting.ivillage.com/baby/bhealth/0,,46v9,00.html
Don’t kiss your baby on the mouth, don’t put anything in your mouth that will come in contact with your child’s mouth or hands. Don’t do what I did. Eat those cheeks up, but stay away from the lips, the pacifier and spoons. Chewing gum with xylitol greatly reduces or eliminates this particular bacteria in moms’ mouths.
*my name is pajama momma and I approve this message
You’d be better off having your kid kiss this.
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For those of you who’ve had children have medical procedures, you know how horrible it is when they administer that medicine that makes your child’s eyes roll back in his head and knock him unconscious.
Wish they’d have used it when they gave Heir No. One the spinal tap when he was 2 months old. Would have saved me the anguish of holding him down and still while he screamed bloody murder and Mrs. BiW was down the hall with her fingers in her ears.
I’m pretty sure I got it making out with Bobby in between classes my freshman year.
Freshman year? Is that what they called Kindergarten at your school? ;-)
Hah, I didn’t have my first kiss till I was a freshman in high school. It pretty much went downhill from there.
Oh that’s an awful story about your kid BiW. Makes my stomach churn.Poor baby.
#1 son was 16 month old and had to have surgery. I’ve been shot at and seen stuff that no human should. Watching my child go under for surgery is the most frightened I’ve been in my life!
Oh, and I’ve spent $28K on my teeth (since 2003) after 30 years of “QUALITY”, government supplied dental care.
Oh, hell, something else to be paranoid about. I’m just going to keep my firstborn right here in the womb. Probably better off that way just in case the election in November turns out to be a disaster!
Learn something new every day…
“For those of you who’ve had children have medical procedures, you know how horrible it is when they administer that medicine that makes your child’s eyes roll back in his head and knock him unconscious.”
Little Imp had to have a VCUG when she was 15 months old and that was horrid. I cried and almost couldn’t stand to watch her like that. But I held her through the entire procedure and when she came out of it….OMG, it was like something out of a horror movie. She was possessed. Hopefully we’ll never have to go through anything like that again!
I did not know about passing a serious bacteria to my kids like that. And my gosh, we’ve been mouth kissers forever (except when ill, ’cause ewwwww)…well for the twenty years I’ve been a mom anyhow. Now I’m seriously freaked out.
I guess I’m buying cases of gum with Xylitol in it from here on out.
My kids gross me out putting their mouths on things I would never think to contact orally. So, like kissing the dog, I would never make oral contact with their mouths, either.
I guess it pays to be squeamish?
Whoa! I had no idea.
I was smug like you when my niece had to have dental crowns put on several teeth and a couple of root canals at age 4. I was not going to put my kids to bed with juice!
And now, I have to take my 3 year old in to get 3 crowns on her molars because they didn’t calcify right? No, she didn’t have any fevers her first year. No, no one in our family has a history of bad teeth. Just bad luck on her part? No one has mentioned this stuff to me!!
I don’t want to see them put her under but I’d rather her first dental experience be one that she really doesn’t remember, ya know?
I guess I lucked out and must not have been a carrier of this bacteria. Never in my wildest thoughts would I have imagined kissing babies could be bad for them.
MCPO- it’s awful. It’s horrendous and I’m so, so lucky my children don’t have anything worse than they do. It breaks my heart for those parents whose children are in chronic pain.
TheRightWife- the best way to raise a great child is to do everything the complete opposite way I do.
becky- yeah, there’s so much dang stuff they didn’t tell us when we took those sweet little angels home from the hospital.
rittenhouse- so I can’t make out with the dog anymore?
T- I like the idea of having my unconscious at the dentist It works for me
anna- I just need to chew more xylitol um, that’s all. I hear that the more stress you have the more the bacteria mulitplies and I was extermely stressed when I had garren.
Hmmm….I practically kissed blisters all over my kid’s faces – lips, nosies, cheeks, pates, when they were babes. They were meant to be chewed on. It’s the whole bonding thing. Then when they were starting solids at 9 months, and didn’t have any back teeth, I chewed their meat with my front teeth and gave it to them. *shrugs* And my mouth is full of the tooth rotting bacteria – not the gum disease kind, my gums are loverly…the tooth rotting kind.
My son never had a cavity until he stopped caring about minimal hygiene at 14.
My daughter had to have a tooth filled at 2, but then she was a big drooler as a baby. Then around 5 or 6, it had to be removed because an abcess formed in the gum above it. Pediatric dentist said it was because the tooth died. Only had one other cavity in a baby tooth that had to do with tonsil removal…long story. No cavities in her permanent teeth.
Did have a friend, whose brother had to get all of his baby teeth yanked due to ‘bottle mouth’.
porknbean- I kissed all over my oldest two kids before I ruined #3. The oldest two both had no problems either. Garren did because I cleaned his pacifier with my mouth. Everyone has this bacteria, but it was an incredibly stressful time for me when Garren was an infant, so I imagine my bacteria count was higher at the time.
When I started researching what and why this happened to Garren it stated most of the time this was from mom’s kissing their babies on the lips. Don’t think I don’t kiss my kids, I just don’t kiss them on the lips. Again, I know this doesn’t happen to everyone, but it would be nice to have been armed with this information. As a former dental assistant I was even ignorant of this fact.
WOW. I’m actually feeling a little outraged that no one TELLS us about this! Except YOU, of course, PJM. What would we do without you, my crusader friend??
Don’t listen to PJ, she’s a cannibal. She wants to fry up Tushar’s kids and eat them like bacon!
Never did the pacifier much. Son used his thumb. Daughter used the paci for a couple of months and was done.
So dirt off the floor is not as bad as mommy spit? I don’t know how many times I see ‘veteran’ moms picking the paci off a variety of floors, the lawn, parking lots, and giving it back to their babies. Not to mention seeing babies knawing on family pets.
mommypie- don’t make me kiss you
b-rad- I don’t see why this is a problem. I’m fond of dark meat
porknbean- I would have been better off just wiping the pacifier on my jeans