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Common signs of teething are drooling, gnawing, biting, and general fussiness and irritability. Your child may feel slightly feverish at times, but no further serious illness should be attributed to teething. He needs more cuddling because of his discomfort, he may wake up more often at night and may want to sleep next to you. All this is part of his pain and discomfort and he should be comforted and solaced.
Mothers are anxious about teething and from the time the baby is three months old they want the doctor or the nurse to tell them whether the baby is teething. You will find this out when the teeth erupt because you will be able to see them.
The first teeth are the lower central incisors which appear between six to nine months. The gums look a bit swollen for a few days and then a tiny white spot appears which is the tooth. During this period, after consulting a clinic or a doctor, some pain reliever may be given to relieve discomfort. Probing around in the baby's mouth with your finger to see if the teeth are there is a bad practice and may lead to infection.
Over the next three to four months, the teeth appear with great rapidity: the lower central pair, the upper central pair, and then two more on either side in the lower and the upper jaw making a total of eight incisors. Sometimes the pattern is changed and the outer incisors may erupt earlier than the central ones. The rest of the teeth erupt according to the chart below. |
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