Looking at crib guards – if I had a small animal that came and gnawed on my child’s crib at night, how would I protect it?

The other day I walked into my daughter’s room to get her in the morning and noticed all this white stuff on her face. I admit that I’d been a little slow coming to get her, as I was finishing getting dressed, so I wondered – was she so fussy because she spit up? As I got closer though, no… it wasn’t spit up. It was paint chips! While standing waiting for me, she’d started gnawing on her crib railing and had pulled the paint off!

I grabbed her out of the crib and started making phone calls to friends. The messages I left went something like this. “Hi. I need your advice. This is totally weird and I’ve never even heard of anything like it, so I doubt there’s much to do, but… She seems to be eating her crib! I’ve never heard of a child doing that! What do I do?” I finally got a couple of friends on the phone who said that they’d never heard of it either, but were “sure it was safe.” In the interim, I’d left a message at the manufacturers and when I didn’t get a response, my husband called too. They assured him that the paint was non-toxic (not lead based!), but that this wasn’t covered under warranty (unless it was peeling due to a defect. Nope – it’s peeling due to teeth.).

So we were left with trying to get her out the crib as soon as we could! No waiting lest she gnaw her way out! (OK, a little overzealous, but you see my point. I put her in the crib for 2 minutes so I could go to the bathroom and she’d gotten a new spot stripped – it took no time!) I had no idea how to make her stop! My only thought was, given her complete and total aversion to solid foods, I could cover the thing in cheerios – she won’t put those anywhere near her mouth! (It’s my proposed solution to anything I don’t want her to chew on. The thing is I’m pretty sure she’ll still decide to chew on those things – it’ll just be coupled with her gagging and throwing up a lot more.)

Finally another friend called back and said – oh, they sell crib guards, but I’m sure other people have already told you this. What? No! What are they? So off we went to babies r us to look for “crib guards.” We looked by cribs and bedding, but nothing. Hmm… OK, let’s ask. The first person I asked didn’t recognize the term and said – what? I started to explain that it prevented the baby from chewing on the crib while my husband said, you know, like if a small animal snuck into our house in the night and started gnawing at the wood of our crib – maybe a beaver? (Because OUR daughter would never do something so crazy…) She directed us to the safety section and we found our answer – essentially a blanket that velcro’s over the front part of the crib – like a saddle blanket (but don’t say that to her – then she’ll start trying to ride it…).

So does anyone else have a child who gnaws on his/her crib? (I’m still feeling like I’m the only one!) And, while we’re on the topic, does anyone else have a child who shows a real aversion to solid food? How did you help them over that hurdle?

Top teeth

I can usually pinpoint the moment her teeth break through to within about an 1 hour. When she sobs and cries and fusses and tosses uncontrollably– to the point where you wonder whether you should call the doctor, social services or an exorcist – for about an hour, you can usually look in after and see a bit of white poking at the gum.

I’ve been lucky enough to miss most of these – the first time, we were at a wedding and she was with a friend of my Mom’s. The next two, my mother in law had her. But I think I was home for the last one – though I’m not sure I totally see the tooth coming through… This may be an extension of the joy of tooth #3. Which means there’s more!

Of course, you might argue that there are, in fact, 16 more. But my mother in law has told me that a lady at Safeway told her that only the first 4 are a problem. She’s decided to go with this – not to seek a second opinion from another person or to start polling shoppers at any other store. Because we like this news. This suggests that we are almost done. We are therefore going with it. Please don’t burst my bubble.

This bites

So even before she had teeth my little one on occasion would decide to clamp down on my nipple when breastfeeding. And, let me tell you, even without teeth – this hurts! Now that she does it with teeth, there’s usually a small scream (from me!) involved. The pediatrician has suggested there is nothing to be done to stop it. I try telling her no, but she doesn’t understand. On occasion, I get kind of mad at her! But how do you “get mad” at a 7 month old. The best I can do is pack up my toys (well, boobs) and go home. She gets rather abruptly handed to her Dad – who always says, you seem kind of angry with her for that – like that’s a crazy reaction. You should see his reaction when she pulls his chest hair and kicks him in his … sensitive areas!

More teething

I remember when my cousin’s oldest was teething. She mentioned that the little girl had 4 teeth at the time. I’d responded with ‘wow, 4 teeth!’ To which she’d said – yup, 4 down, 16 more to go. Though I sort of knew that teething could be difficult, I really couldn’t understand what she meant. Now I’m beginning to.

The munchkin has 2 teeth so far. The first seems to have poked through when we went to a wedding two or three weeks ago and she was being watched by a friend of my Mom’s. I’d called to check in on her and she’d told me – oh, she’s fine. She cried and howled inconsolably for 45 minutes earlier, but I knew it was just gas and teething, so I didn’t bother to call you. Oh jeez. The next day she mentioned to my Mom that the baby’s teeth had come through / were already showing. I looked and sure enough the first one had poked through – and we’d just missed the worst of it. Awesome. Maybe they can all come in when I’m not looking…

The next one seemed to have poked through about a week later – this one seemed to have only been accompanied by 20 minutes of wailing (for my mother in law) – so clearly we’re making progress! If the next one is less than 10, than under 5, but the 5th or 6th tooth, we’ll hardly have time to respond before she feels better. Riiiiiiiiight…..

We’ve only seen the two so far, but the crying seems to indicate more on their way. I mentioned the unhappiness yesterday morning (this morning felt fairly similar), but there was another long period of it last night. She just didn’t want to be put down all evening – and really wanted to be held by me – usually to nurse. Of course I was trying to work this around packing and her bath time and maybe getting some dinner myself. She actually wasn’t too bad for the early part of the evening and I did get some packing done. Getting some eating done was not nearly so smooth a process. She finally fell asleep sometime after 9:30 (I think close to 10, but I was starting to lose count).

So on that note I say – 2 down, 18 to go.

Teething – My God, My God, Why have you abandoned me?

She's actually not too bad overall with the teething process, but does go through longer periods of fussiness and sometimes cries up this pitiful storm. Example: This morning she was whimpering a little in her crib as I was getting ready. I walked in and she smiled when she saw me but the crying got a little louder as I walked past her (to open the drapes!). I picked her up, which caused the crying to abate somewhat, not fully, but became a full scale offensive when she was put down on the changing table for a diaper check. She screamed through that whole process (picture it as a baby version of "my God, my God, why have you abandoned me?") so that I stopped to feed her as soon as the new diaper was on (no clothes). Oh, I should probably note that the door was open as my husband was loading the truck for moving (so all the neighbors were getting front row seats to this concert. They must have waited a little while to call child protective services, as they didn't arrive before I left.). I fed her for a bit and when she seemed to be slowing eating, I pulled her off to get her dressed and finish getting ready for work, but that was immediately met with full scale wailing, so I put her right back! Through liberal use of the baby bjorn and swing, I was able to finish getting ready / eating and she seemed better - though I passed her off to her Dad with a warning about potential teething.

I was maybe 2 miles from home when I got a call that he felt a lot of teeth buds (and I think the screaming had resumed) so she was getting some Tylenol.