My Child Has Autism, How Can I Brush Their Teeth?

In the Know for You to Know

As parents we are always looking out for our children, empowering and supporting them to achieve their best quality of life while also promoting acceptance, inclusion, and celebrating our differences. This is especially true for parents whose child has Autism or is on the Autism Spectrum.

Every child responds in their own way to events they encounter every day. For children with Autism their reactions may be unforeseen because of communication challenges, or certain behavioral characteristics such as difficulty with changes in routine and sensory sensitivities.

As a parent it can be difficult for you to look in your child’s mouth, let alone brush their teeth. For some it may be difficult to let you know their teeth are bothering them. Sometimes you notice habits like grinding their teeth, hitting their mouth and teeth, chewing on non-food objects, or eating sugary foods and drinks; which can affect their dental health.

This is also stressful for you when you’re trying to establish healthy dental hygiene habits and your child is overwhelmed by sounds, smells, tastes, textures, flavors, and your child becomes anxious.

So what to do and where to start?

First Focus On Introducing Your Home Dental Hygiene Routine

A calm place is a great way to start.

Create a step by step picture guide book (aka social story or story board) or an activity schedule. Either one or both are quite helpful and go a long way to establishing your routine.

When putting together your picture book you may want to start talking about why we have teeth. The answer is that teeth help us eat, talk and give us our smiles.

You can begin by yourself or include your child while you talk about brushing teeth as you cut and paste pictures, take family photos, or make drawings of each step of your routine.

Your guide book can include picture sections for:

Today we going to brush my teeth in the bathroom (insert picture or photo of a bathroom)	These are the times we brush our teeth every day (pictures of clock with AM and PM times)	I am going to stand in the bathroom in front of the bathroom sink (picture of bathroom sink)	My Mommy/Daddy will be in the bathroom with me and I will look at my Mommy/Daddy (picture of parent)	We are going to use a tooth brush to brush my teeth. This is my tooth brush, it’s soft (picture of your child’s tooth brush)
We are going to use dental floss to clean between my teeth. This is my dental floss (picture of your child’s dental floss)	We are going to put tooth paste on my tooth brush. This is my toothpaste (picture of tooth paste on your child’s toothbrush)	I need to open my mouth. I will open my mouth wide and stay open (picture of your child with their mouth open wide)	I need to brush my teeth for 2 minutes. This is my timer to brush my teeth (picture of your child’s timer with 2 minutes showing)	This is how Mommy/Daddy wash the tooth paste off my teeth (picture of a wet wash cloth or your child spitting into the sink)
I like this and I’m doing great (picture of smiles or thumbs up)	Mommy/Daddy are flossing and brushing my teeth now (picture of flossing and brushing teeth), Then we’ll take the tooth paste off my teeth (picture of wash cloth or your child spitting into the sink)	This is my tooth brushing timer counting down the 2 minutes I’m brushing my teeth (picture of their timer counting down)	I did a great job (picture of you both smiling together)	I may get a prize (recommended but this is up to you to decide about a small reward like a sticker, then take a picture with the sticker).

You may want to put together an activity sheet. To do this print out fun monthly calendar pages and include 2 boxes for each day of the month, 1 box to check off for AM brushing and 1 box for PM brushing and flossing (recommended but totally your decision when to include).

1 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	2 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	3 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	4 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	5 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	6 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	7 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing
8 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	9 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	10 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	11 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	12 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	13 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	14 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing
15 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	16 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	17 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	18 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	19 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	20 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	21 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing
22 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	23 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	24 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	25 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	26 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	27 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	28 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing
29 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	30 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing	31 AM Brushing PM Flossing and Brushing

Sometimes this can take one sitting to complete or it may take several. What’s important is to keep going because when you’re done your creation is going to be AMAZING!

For now start putting together your family’s picture guide book and/or activity sheet, so that you’re ready for next week’s post when we discuss steps 2 through 4.

What are your suggestions for the picture guide book or activity sheet? We’d really love to know. Email us at kidstoothhotline@protonmail.me Like Us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/kidstoothhotline.

More tips? We have lots. We’re here just for kids!