which is better - thumbsucking or pacifier?

Question

my baby is 8 months old and sucks his thumb a lot. im just wonderin if i let him use pacifier it'll be better.

Answer 1

Pacifier, I knew a girl who had a permanently bent thumb, it could grow crooked. Fingers also touch much more than a pacifier and would have more germs. It is harder to break the habit if using fingers too.

Answer 2

It's best to avoid both if you can. A pacifier can always be taken away, but it's not like you can cut off his thumb, you know? :)

Pacifiers today are "orthodontic" and won't make your baby's teeth misshapen like a hard thumb will. If he's 8 months old and doesn't use a pacifer, DON'T give him one. They're mainly used for newborns to comfort them (the sucking motion is the only way a baby can comfort himself when he's so little). I'm going through this now with my 2 1/2 year old...we FINALLY weaned him off his Binky. He's not sucking his thumb, but he walks around constantly with his fingers in his mouth. I posted a question about it a week or so ago, and another poster suggested buying something from the grocery store/drug store called Bitter Apple. (I think that's what it's called.) I asked the pharmacist at Kroger about it last weekend, and he said he'd never heard of it, but they did sell something called Thumb-B-Gone, and it was in the baby aisle. My kids started acting up at that point (tired of sitting in the shopping carts lol) so we left, but I'm going to look for it this weekend.

Some people suggested putting Tabasco sauce on my son's fingers so that he'll get a mouthful of hot when he sucks his fingers. I see this as an accident waiting to happen. What if he rubs his eyes? That would be horrible.

Answer 3

I think that a pacifier is better...hopefully he'll take it now after sucking his thumb. You can take it away from him, and even though he might cry, he'll get over soon. Like other people have said, make sure you start weaning him off of it around a year or so, so that it will be easier to eventually take it away. I am an elementary teacher, and have seen kids in fifth grade STILL sucking their thumbs...I don't think they'd want to have a pacifier in their mouths at that age though!!! :o)

Answer 4

Let him suck on whatever he wants to. Pacifiers can have designs that supposedly cause less "damage" to teeth. But, by the time your baby could damage his teeth with a pacifier or thumbsucking, he won't have such an intense need anymore for sucking. He's right at teething age. He'll want to suck much more than usual while he's teething. The more you let him suck now, the less likely he will have sucking disorders later in life, such as cigarette smoking, uncontrollable urges to talk all the time, and over-eating. Later, when your son is learning from books and tapes and film, encourage him to chew gum or suck on a lollypop while passively reading or listening. Sucking behaviors while passively learning promotes central nervous system (brain) assimilation and synthesis of information.

Answer 5

Definately a pacifier...My daughter is 6 years old and I still cant make her stop sucking her thumb. At least you can take a pacifier away.

Answer 6

Use the pacifier because you can take it away. This is what I did to wean her off the pacifier. I only gave her ones that were a specific shape (the ones that had a tip that was kinda flat at an angle). And when it came time to wean her off, I only gave her the kind that were long and bulb shaped. She didn't like the change and weaned herself. It is difficult to take away a child's thumb.

Answer 7

my nephew is 2 and he is still sucking his thumb, but there are times that it has caused such dry skin that it caused the skin on the base of the thumb to crack, must have hurt! a pacifier would be a hard habit to break also, if I had to choose I'd choose the thumb, I had my pacifier until I was 4!

Answer 8

Pacifier is better, because you can't take a thumb away. Eventually, he'll give it up. We told our son at age 2 that "big boys" who sleep in big beds don't use a pacifier, and that was all the incentive he needed to give it up.

Answer 9

I had a thumb sucker. Never liked the pacifier much but used it. Child went from pacifier to thumb--even into the teens--not in public but when she got sick with pneumonia and mono.

Answer 10

the pacifier is easy to get rid of i wouldnt let him suck his thumb its an awful habit to break, i know someone very close to me who sucked his thumb until his first child was born and he was 22 at the time when the child was born only reason he stopped is because she was picking up on the bad habit. Good luck!