The Joys of Teething

Zechariah got his first tooth at 3 months and it was horrible. He screamed non-stop at Christmas and made strange with everyone. Nice first Christmas. We didn't know what was wrong and after the many excursions to the Stollery's hospital due to hernia's, infections, heart murmurs, we thought we were going insane. When the first pearly white popped through we were relieved yet scared........Is this how it is going to be for all of his teeth.

This past month has been the most stressful month of my life. Moving and trying to get settled in a brand new country, with no friends, no family and no church, it has been so extremely hard. Zech has been miserable, absolutely miserable too! We are questioning are parenting, wondering what we could be doing better, or what we should be doing period. Found lots of good books, which I will share later.

However, we now discovered that he is teething yet once again. First a few weeks ago I noticed that he kept jamming his fists in his mouth and screaming, so I started fishing and sure enough his two top molars had cut through, so off to the pharmacy for some medicine. We have tried everything--frozen teething toys, frozeen carrots, herbal teething medicine, orajel, but the only thing that seems to settle him a bit is children's advil, which I hate giving to him.

Slowly the molars are breaking through, and he is not getting any better. I was angry with him for acting up and then he got upset and really started crying and I noticed that there was blood in the lower right side of his mouth. Could that be another molar???? Why yes it was--now three teeth coming in at once. I tell John about the new discovery and he says well what about the lower left incisor tooth that is poking through. You have got to be kidding me---4 teeth at once. He still isn't getting any easier to deal with and we are feeding him frozen strawberries like crazy. We were on the road this past week and going crazy because of our extremely irritated boy, who will not settle (and we forgot the teething medicine) and I decided to go on another exploratory journey in his mouth. I have to be careful now when I try and explore his mouth as he will chomp down pretty hard on my fingers and he already has a mouthful of teeth. So, he let me explore and apply pressure to his gums and sure enough I found it----the fifth tooth. Yes he is also getting his bottom right i-tooth. So five teeth in a one month span and I also think that his last molar will break through here any day now.

If anyone has any other tips or advise on how to deal with a teething baby----I am clearly open to anything and everything that anyone has to offer! I do wish he was born with them!!!!