They sent two different Y Chews for us to try, a blue and a green. One of them was a little more firm than the other. I did give them to Kamdyn to try out, but I decided not have her use them very much, because she is not a big mouther or chewer, and I didn't want to encourage her to do so. They definitely seem very sturdy, and I think they would last a while even for children with teeth.
Brooklynn also tried them, and I found that they were wonderful for teething.
When I posted the picture above of Brooklynn on Facebook, I got a couple of responses about them.
One mom said, "They'd be great for redirecting those kids who like to chew on EVERYTHING, though!"
Someone else, who had some personal experience with using them, said, "They were great for Jess when he wouldn't stop chewing everything. We would get him these and those chewable necklaces."
We also tried a set of 3 Lip Bloks. The mouth piece of each one was a different length. The first one, a yellow one, had a pretty large amount of space between the block and the top of the straw.
The blue one had a little less.
And the green one has a very small nub, which pretty much forces the user to put their lips against the block.
As you can see from the picture above with the yellow Lip Blok, Kamdyn does not have any tongue protrusion with a small straw. I think that if she did, this would help to train her tongue to stay back.
The difficult thing about using these, however, are that they are a bit awkward, so it is not comfortable or convenient for the child to use. You couldn't just hand your child a cup with this in the straw and expect them to use it. It takes hands-on adult assistance. And because of that, it also takes away independence from the child. Kamdyn cooperated the first couple of times that I tried them, and I was able to get these very blurry pictures, but she grew more and more resistant to using them. I feel like they would be a good tool to use in therapy if the therapist is willing.
My final review on these products would be that they are well-made and affordable at $24.99 for a 4 pack of Y Chews and $9.99 for a set of 3 Lip Bloks with straws that they attach to. I think they would be very useful for a child with feeding issues and feeding therapy.
For feeding therapy, I have also heard speech therapists recommend using a product like this Basic Bear Bottle Kit to help with straw drinking. Kamdyn's Early Intervention Speech Pathologist used the Oral Motor Probe Set while she worked on oral-motor exercises with Kamdyn. And a fellow Down syndrome mom commented about the Z-vibe that, "it's been the only way i can give her [child] solids without her instantly spitting them out."
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