I never wanted to give either of my children a pacifier. 1. I didn’t want to have to wean them off of it. 2. I had heard and read that pacifiers were bad for kids gums/teeth. So I planned while pregnant with my firstborn that I wasn’t going to give my kids a pacifier.
Well……….my firstborn had different plans. He HATED car rides. I would have to sit in the back seat with him to keep him calm. Sometimes that didn’t work. When I went somewhere by myself with him I would have to hold his hand while driving, for him not to be screaming at the top of his lungs. Driving was STRESSFUL! I would play happy kiddie songs in the car. Didn’t work. I would play relaxing music/soundscapes in the car. Didn’t work. So I gave in and bought a pacifier. The little cute one with an animal attached. A WubbaNub pacifier. I put it in his mouth and a silent car ride. THANK YOU LORD!!
Let me tell you about my secondborn. She did well in the car. PRAISE GOD! She never got a pacifier BUT she started sucking her first two fingers on her left hand. At first, I didn’t care much about it. I thought to myself “She’ll stop when she is ready.” Then when she started being more mobile and we went to The Children’s Museum, library, playground, etc. and she would put her fingers in her mouth after touching something my skin would crawl. YUCK!! ALL the germs!! I just knew she would be sick all the time. Luckily, she didn’t get sick often.
When she was 1 1/2-2 years old, I started trying to get her to stop sucking her fingers. I tried a few things:
- When she had her fingers in her mouth I would tell her that they were in her mouth and remind her to get them out because we didn’t do that. Didn’t work.
- I put aloe plant on her two fingers. Didn’t work.
- I put medical tape on her index finger. I had read in a Fb moms group that I am in that this worked for her 6-year-old son. Didn’t work.
- I put a cute bandage (Princess/Paw Patrol/Trolls) on her index finger. Worked, kinda.
So the bandage was working but I would take it off during naptime and bedtime so she could have her fingers for comfort plus I wanted to be able to sleep through the night without her getting up. We did this for a while then after going to the dentist a couple times and seeing that her sucking her fingers was pushing her front top gum line forward my husband and I decided we needed to get her fingers out of her mouth 24/7.
I broke down and bought Mavala. I’m into natural things but my natural/non-chemical options were not doing the job. Our pediatric dentist had suggested Mavala but the package recommended it for 3-year-olds and older. She’ll be 3 in March so I decided to give it a try in December. Our dentist knew that I was into natural remedies so she gave me her essential oils book to look through and I found nothing. We put the Mavala on at night every other night for a week. I put it on her first two finger fingernails and put it on my thumb fingernail. (I try everything I give my kids. Yes, I am that mom) The first night she put her fingers in her mouth while I was still putting on her pajamas and her face was hilarious. lol She asked for her juice cup trying to get the taste out of her mouth. I put my thumb in my mouth to see how bad it was and OH MY GOODNESS!! DISGUSTING! After that first night, she didn’t put her fingers in her mouth anymore. It worked!
She still might need braces one day but at least I can say I tried early on in her life. Braces or no braces, Everything will be JUST fine!
Did you suck your fingers as a kid or do/have your children suck/sucked their fingers? What did you do to stop? What have you tried with your kids? I would love to hear.
