Dread

There’s a part of the day I dread. The very thought of it sends me into a cold sweat. As the cursed hour hurtles ever nearer the pressure in my head starts to build, throbbing at my temples and clutching my stomach in a vice-like grip.

Toothbrush time.

There, I said it.

I hate toothbrush time. But not as much as my nearly 2 year old daughter.

Don’t get me wrong, it didn’t used to be this way. In the early days of The Toothbrush, Frog would positively welcome her spiky friend with open arms. She would gum and suck the minty paste and rub that brush all over the pearly white niblets in her mouth.

But then she turned 18 months old.

Since Christmas time, the toothbrush hour has been detested. The sight of the wretched thing goes down like a lead balloon. The screams resonate around the bathroom, ringing in my ears. My eyes sting as I attempt, with false jocularity, to encourage my toothbrush-phobic daughter to put the object of hate in her mouth.

I blame Baby-led Weaning. It’s encouraged an irritating sense of independence in my daughter. She won’t let us get her dressed, so why would she let us brush her teeth? The sight of us brushing ours is greeted with much hilarity from our stubborn toddler, who can’t understand why anyone would do such a thing.

And then I was sent a product to review. It languished for weeks unopened. In fact, I even buried it at the bottom of a drawer. “I can’t write about this thing”, I thought. “We’re all going to hate it. I wish they’d never sent it to me.”

The Brush Baby Chewable Toothbrush and Toothpaste was eventually brought forth this evening. It took me a few minutes to summon up the courage to unwrap them. My fingers shook.

The image of my own battle with rotten milk teeth as a child spurred me on. My child would not suffer the same fate as her mother, being nicknamed “The Orange Squash Junkie” by her dentist. No siree. My child would keep those sparkly teeth, come rain or shine.

So I took a deep breath and handed Frog the rubbery textured toothbrush, telling her it was a “special toothbrush”.

Here’s what she did with it:

Undeterred, I explained that hippo didn’t need any new glasses. So I encouraged the Toothbrush of Doom inside Frog’s mouth. And, lo, it stayed there.

For about half a minute, before it landed on the wrong side of the bath with a soft thud.

Oh well. Better than nothing.

***

Disclaimer: I was not charged for this review sample. I only write about products relevant to our family and always give my honest opinion. Obviously. Although this is a review post, it’s also a post about my daughter’s hatred of the toothbrush, something that would inevitably ended up here anyway (tips welcome, by the way).

You can purchase the Brush Baby Chewable Toothbrush and Toothpaste for £4.99 and £2.35 respectively. Stockists include Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, John Lewis and Mothercare.