Baby Bottle Tooth Decay and the Dangers of Nighttime Feeding

Many infants and toddlers become dependant on pacifiers to be able to sleep at night. My daughter never used a pacifier; instead she would only go to sleep with a bottle. As more and more of her teeth began to come in, I was concerned about what is often referred to as baby bottle tooth decay. With the help of my daughter’s physician, we were able to come up with a plan to wean her from her bottle dependency.

To be honest, I was a little bit embarrassed and almost felt like a bad parent. I have had and still constantly have problems with my own teeth and want to spare my daughter that pain. Her doctor actually informed me that many infants and toddlers use bottles to get to sleep at night. She stated that now is the time to swing into action.

Whether it is a bottle, a pacifier, a sippy cup, or a blanket, weaning a child off of a certain item can be difficult. It took about a week and a half to get my daughter off of her bedtime milk sippy cup, well kind of. Apparently the sucking action is what helps her calm down and go to sleep. Water is safe for children to drink and does not harbor any potential dangerous bacteria, she now goes to sleep with a cup filled of water. We began by each night replacing a portion of the milk with some water, until there was no more milk left.

A bedtime bottle (or sippy cup) is unhealthy to a child’s teeth because babies may fall asleep with the bottle nipple still in their mouth. If the nipple is left in their mouth for a long period of time, fluid can leak out. Milk and juice have sugars which can be broken down into acid, which will eat away the enamel of your baby’s teeth. It is important that you do not give a bedtime bottle or cup to your child even before they develop teeth. The longer they have a bottle, the harder it is to take it away from them.

If tooth decay were to occur in your child, a dentist could help fix the problem. It is recommend that you take care of the situation when you can and not rely just on the dentist. Take care of your children’s teeth and prevent them from having to have potential painful and unnecessary treatments to repair them.