Teething and Teeth A first tooth! How exciting! It's also a little reminder that your precious little newborn is growing everyday and you may not see that gummy smile again. When does the process of teething begin? Generally a baby will get their first tooth around 6 months. However, this does vary from baby to baby. If your baby develops teeth before or after 6 months it is completely normal and nothing to worry about. The first tooth will nearly always be one of the front bottom teeth. When a baby begins teething, there is no set pattern on when it will begin, how long it will take and how painful it will be. For one baby cutting a tooth might happen overnight without pain, while another child might have to go through a long, drawn out and painful experience. You may sometimes visibly see a rise or lump in the gum for several weeks, while sometimes there may be no visible clue at all until the tooth actually appears. The process of teething often follows hereditary patterns, so if the mother and father teethed early or late, your baby may follow the same pattern. On average the first tooth comes in during the seventh month, although it can arrive as early as three months, as late as a year, or in rare cases even earlier or later. Which teeth come in first and how many will there be? In total there are twenty primary (first) teeth, which is twelve