As a first time mom you can often feel overwhelmed with all of the stages your new baby is going thru. From learning to Breastfeed, survive the sleepless nights (even if you don't live in Seattle!) to finding the "right" answers of when and how to do it all.

*I'd like to make a caveat statement that goes along all of the articles I publish*

"There is no right or wrong to parenting and mothering your child Mamas. When you gave birth, inside your belly remained this new powerful tool mothers should always tap into called, 'Your Gut Feeling'. As you walk along life's journey, everything you encounter, hear, learn and experience will either lead you towards it or push you away....that is what I am referring to. Go with it."

In regards to teething, I will be sharing my personal experience and what I learned thru my own research after I became a mother.

When my first was 6 months old the doctors "protocol" said that I should begin introducing solids, and as a first time mother, I won't lie- I was excited for this new milestone! So we did, just like "the book says", we started with veggies and avoided sweet fruit, one at a time for a week to assure there were no allergies. We chose to make our own baby purees (I hadn't learned of baby led weaning yet).

Within a month of playing and introducing solids, my perfectly healthy once exclusively breastfed baby was extremely constipated. We has the worst experience with this. I remember one night having her lay on the changing table, grunting and pushing while she cried and my husband and I tried our best to comfort her as we help facilitate and guide her ginormously hard stool out of her tiny little body.

This event became a regular thing and we never one tied it to the concept that we may have introduced solids a little to early. Yes she was sitting up on her own, showing interest in foods, using her pincher fingers to grab small things and able to bring it to her own mouth....but what we failed to understand at that time was that the inside of her body may have not been ready to digest it all.

Our journey in recovering the stress and damage on her little colon has been long. We still see the side effects 7 years later....

The good news is, I learned something with my first and did it different with my second.  It wasn't right or wrong, it just settled better the second time around with my "gut" because I did the research and we all know that knowledge is power.

So apparently, there is a digestive enzyme that is the trigger to push that first tooth to finally cut thru the gums.  That same enzyme is what creates your baby's first acidic juices for the digestive tract and prepares babies stomach for food other than breastmilk!

So, no babies don't need teeth chew solids, but if we are talking physiologically, they do need their first tooth present to begin the digestion process of introducing solids, even if it purees.

Food for though.

Act in Love.

Go in Peace.