When you have a little one with low muscle tone, they can often have troubles with oral motor control and drooling. What about when you want do discourage the excess watering of the mouth? Today our friend, Molly, a speech therapist from The Speech Teacher shares her sage wisdom to help do the trick and help your child drool less.
Drooling is a part of the little one’s world. We see and feel a lot of wet bibs and t-shirts, particularly during the teething phase! However, sometimes children drool too much and/or too often. If your tiny friend is excessively drooling, it’s time to check in on this behavior. It is always best to visit with the ENT first so that they can use their magic to assess all of the physical structures properly. I am also going to share my favorite tips & tricks for our drooly loves!
- Let’s Keep It Closed
If our mouth is closed, we are most likely not drooling! Ensuring that your child has a closed mouth posture is crucial. A closed mouth posture means that your little one has closed lips and is breathing from the nose. Our noses are perfectly designed for filtering (thank you nose hairs), warming, moisturizing, and smelling the air we breathe. The nose is also equipped with mucus that captures and kills germs. Additionally, nose breathing ensures proper balance of O2 and CO2 levels in our bodies (mouth breathing usually leads to hyperventilation). Children who breathe from their mouth often snore at night, get sick more often, feel fatigued, can be inattentive, and are at risk for crooked teeth. Research has also linked mouth breathing with behavioral difficulties, learning deficits, and speech errors. Once you have spoken to the ENT and ensured that there are no physical factors interfering with your child’s ability to maintain a closed mouth posture, it is simply a matter of building a better habit!
- Tools Do The Trick
- Sweatbands
Wristbands are a great trick for little droolers. They should fit comfortably on their wrists and last for a good portion of the day. I like using sweatbands because your little one has more control in wiping their own mouth throughout the day. You may need to remind them when their chin is getting wet, however it shouldn’t take long for them to take the reigns! Additionally, we want our children to start to feel the difference between a dry chin and a wet chin. That is, if we allow their chins to be wet all day, they will become accustomed to that feeling. We want to keep the chin as dry as possible so that they can start to feel when it becomes wet.
- Timers & Watches
Sometimes our friends need reminders to simply, “swallow” when saliva builds up. You don’t want to have a timer going off all day, so it’s best to pick a time when drool is usually heavy. Perhaps when you two are playing 1 on 1 for an hour or so you have the timer going off as a ‘swallow reminder.’ The amount of time depends on your little one so you will have to start with trial and error. Pick the time that is a few seconds before the drool starts to escape from the lips so that they have time to swallow successfully. If your child is old enough, you can use a timer stopwatch that they wear on their wrist as a reminder for themselves. The goal is that your child will start to swallow on his or her own without needing the timer because you are building the habit.
- Straw Drinking
It is preferred to have your little one use a straw cup, and get rid of the sippy cups & pacifiers. Sippy cups and pacifiers prolong an immature sucking pattern that we want to move away from. Straws on the other hand promote better lip closure, drinking patterns, and tongue movement. The pattern we use when drinking from a straw is the same pattern we use to “catch” the saliva that drops from our mouth. I also like to use varying temperatures with straw cups. We want to increase our children’s awareness and icy cold water can do the trick!
- Humming
Humming is a wonderfully quick & easy activity to do throughout the day. Humming provides a nice, closed mouth posture and the vibrations increase sensation and awareness! You can hum along to favorite songs or make silly sounds using humming noises. With older children you can play a guessing game where you take turns humming a song that the other tries to guess.
- Wipe It Right
Yes, there is a preferred way to mop up drool. It is simple though, I promise. You want to start under the bottom lip and wipe up toward the top lip to help promote a closed mouth posture. That’s it!
- Remember to Remind
I know it feels like I just gave you a lot of things to remember to remind your child to do. But it will be very worth it when the proper habits have been built and you see a dry mouth! I am a big fan of consistency because it makes a huge difference in the speed at which we accomplish our goals. The more consistent you are, the faster you will see lasting progress. You can use 1-2 key phrases that feel comfortable throughout the day. For example, you can use, “close lips” when you see your little one with an open mouth. You can try, “catch it” when saliva has built up on the lips but there is still time to suck it back and swallow. I also use, “lick your lips” for some children because it is an easier direction. You know your child best and can pick any phrase feels right for you. It is also a team effort so get siblings, family members, caregivers, teachers, and friends involved — we are all in this together!
Molly has just published her first book and has offered my readers a free copy! Sign up below for this awesome giveaway where we will select one lucky reader to receive a FREE copy. To enter simply drop your email address in below to join both the Cedar’s Story email list as well as Molly’s email list and your chance to win! This giveaway will be open from 9/24/2017 through 10/2/2017 so enter now.
Molly is a New York City-based Speech Language Pathologist and Feeding Therapist. She is ASHA (American Speech 
and Hearing Association) Certified and trained in the SOS (Sequential Oral Sensory) Approach to Feeding. She received her Masters in Speech Language Pathology from Teacher’s College, Columbia University, and her Bachelors in Speech and Hearing Science from George Washington University. She currently works with the birth-5 population conducting evaluations & providing speech and feeding therapy in NYC. Molly provides therapy in the home as well as in a special needs preschool setting. You can find her on Instagram @thespeechteacher where she posts daily pops of knowledge and connect with her on her site as well as Facebook.
Dianna is the QUEEN of drool! Even though we’ve have been reminding her to close her mouth from a very early age (getting her into good habits), she drools A LOT. Thus the drool bibs even though she’s 5.
But these are such incredibly helpful tips! And, I think I’m going to make some crochet wristbands now! Dianna already wipes her mouth when I say, “You’re drooling.” She can just wear a pretty boho wristband and not worry. Thanks!