One of Addy's favorite things is taking a bath and brush her teeth. I am just hoping this continues because Cooper's toothbrush spent a week in his suitcase before we realized he hadn't been brushing his teeth. Supermom aren't I? Fortunately Miss Addy has come a LONG way when it comes to her oral defensiveness and severe feeding aversion. Libby Kumin is a famous speech pathologist who works with children with Down syndrome, I highly recommend anything she has written! Many infants with Down syndrome are very sensitive to touch, especially in the oral cavity. When Addy came home at nine months she was so orally defensive that just washing her face made her cringe. She didn't mouth toys until she was over two years old. She freaked when we brushed her teeth, it was a major fight. Now she asks to do it all of the time! What we have done to help Addy is expose her to as many things as we can. We have used vibration, a nuk brush, pacifiers (she never sucked on them though), different textures on teethers, she has a ton of different spoons, some with textures, some just coated and some plastic and some softer, and we've rubbed her cheeks with wash cloths. Especially before feedings and teeth brushing. Due to her feeding/swallowing difficulties she has only been exposed to so many foods. She loves thins that are salty and spicy. Highly flavored foods usually can mask or make the texture of the food more tolerable for our kiddos. .Anyway, here are some adorable pix of my girl at the beginning of teeth brushing (I couldn't take pix and brush her teeth at the same time, see I'm definitely not a supermom!) and her bath time!
7 comments:
Oh my, she is soooo adorable! Bella loves bath time too! Thank goodness.
Paula
What a cutie you have. My son Malachi is 15 months old and still not able to eat an sort of solid. He is still on milk and baby food. And the baby food hes not a huge fan of. If I put something like a cheerio in his mouth he gags until he throws up. Ugh. I have no idea what to do, and our speech therapist isnt much help, as she tells me to keep trying. Soooo frustrating. Any ideas?
OH, that smile! Good brushing!
It's funny , we have tried all those things one Emilia too, only to get her to stop putting things in her mouth. She's slightly obsessed about mouthing everything.
Had to laugh about Cooper not brushing his teeth for a week. I'm terrible about keeping track of that around here as well.
I LOVE the last picture.Thanks for this post.Zoey sounds so similar to Addy.Serious oral aversion.Won't even tell you how many times her teeth have been brushed.Talk about super mom.Anyway,Zoey BEGAN nursing at 6 months of age AFTER her heart surgery and took to eating food like a champ. soon after.Seizures and chemo came and now nothing.Seriously nothing.Great feeding specialist but we have made no progress.Zoey is stubborn!I'll check out that books from Libby Kumin though.Again,thanks.I don't feel as alone!
What a cutie!!! Thanks for the info on the author! Gavin DETESTS teeth brushing time! Hopefully one day he will follow in Addy's footsteps!
I love my cute little Addy.
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