Teething - bad advice??

SeaSoul

I just read this somewhere online and it sounds silly to me:

Whatever you do, don't put your baby to bed with a bottle or nurse him to sleep once his teeth come in, since he's now prone to cavities.

I know it's important to prevent cavities but at the expense of nursing before bed?  I don't know about that.

LMH1209

Yep, you're supposed to start cleaning the baby's teeth once they come in.  (Wiping with damp gauze is the suggestion that I've read.)  You could still nurse before bed (and then clean his teeth).  You just couldn't nurse him to sleep. 

Now, I don't know how many people follow that recommendation, at least if their babies have teeth but aren't yet able to go to sleep without falling asleep nursing.  If the choice is between dirty teeth or no sleep, I'd go with the dirty teeth, but I suppose it's still a good goal to have clean teeth and a baby who can fall asleep when put to bed drowsy.

anna7602

I've actually read that nursing to sleep is not as bad for teeth as giving a bottle before bed. The reason is that the bottle continues dripping milk into the baby's mouth while your letdown has usually stopped well before you pull your sleeping baby off of the breast.

You can take that for whatever it's worth.

SeaSoul

Huh.  This is all very interesting and I'm suprised I've never heard it!