Who Needs a Mother-in-Law* When There's an Internet?

Binkie Update:

It was so easy to wean Nat from the binkie that we just went ahead and did it even though our houseguests were here. All the frantic hollaring from you people just encouraged me to be all the more ruthless. I am pig-headed like that. Ask my mother.

For your information, Nat is SIX MONTHS old. She has only been "attached" to her binkie beyond its most basic utilitarian purposes for a month or so. I figured I could take it now, relatively painlessly for her, or I could let her keep it and have to take it later when she'd be much more attached to it. So, now.

As for the evils of thumb-sucking, I have read sound advice that it turns out (via actual statistical evidence) that thumb-suckers do not have worse teeth problems than non-thumb-suckers. Of the five thumb-suckers in my informal poll (three friends, my little brother and Cole) only one (my little brother) needed braces.

Extended binkie-users, however, are known (through statistical evidence and all that) to have more speech delays than non-binkie-users. And we are all about expressing yourself in this family.

Thumbs are solidly in the control of their owners. Binkies require policing and cleaning.

As a life-long insomniac, I will do anything in my power to give my daughter the ability to put herself sleep when she needs to. Meanwhile, she has one blankie and two stuffed animals that she can attach to, while sucking happily away at her thumb.

The binkie withdrawal just entailed a couple of extra-long stints in the rocking chair and Mama Shannon's usual lullabyes. And with one full-time stay-at-home mom, one mom who languishes in the family bed over tea all morning and comes home early from work more than half the time and assorted aunties and uncles who vy to hold the baby all week long, I do not think Nat is suffering from anything around here being insufficiently about her.

So tsk tsk right back at you people. Let's save the righteous indignation for the Bush administration, gasoline price-gouging and the environmental and economic racism that has left Madison's birth family and so many others stranded in New Orleans from now on, 'kay?

* In all fairness, my own mother-in-law would never second-guess that I know what's best for my daughter, frankly.

Comments

[Holly]

Go get'em, girl!

Glad it was painless and I think you were smart to do it now before she was attached more to it.

Our babies have lovies and bedtime music to put them to sleep. One is a finger sucker (two middle) and the other isn't. Overall, our sleep issues have been minimal. When they wake up, we comfort them and turn their music back on and they go back to sleep.

I'm sure people will tell us that's wrong for some reason, but it works and they are happy, attached kids.

[Angel]

Amen!! I'm glad it went smoothly :)

[Gawdessness]

Well, okay, but now we have to work on the you leaving that beautiful baby in a cardboard box and letting her play with power tools. They just aren't appropriate for a baby. And about that frozen food you've been feeding her. At least thaw it first!

[frog]

I sucked my thumb and needed braces, but those things weren't related. I had my mothers precise overbite and other alignment problems--she didn't suck her thumb.

Good for you for doing what you know to be right. I'm paying close attention and taking notes for momdom, should it ever appear for me.

[Moxie]

Another data point here: I sucked my thumb until I was eleven (that's a 10 and a 1) years old. When I got braces last year (bottom teeth) I asked the ortho if it was related to thumb-sucking. She said no way--it was genetic because two of my teeth were too small. Sure enough, my mother and brother (neither of them thumb-suckers) have the same problem. FWIW, the ortho didn't stop her own daughter from sucking her thumb until she was 6 years old.

[cluttergirl]

ROFL!! Is that supposed to be a tsk tsk to the blogland motherinlawing? How frightfully unrealistic! :D My family was never a soother family, though I was manically attached to my blankie (mom slowly reduced it to a mere stamp by chopping it in half each time she washed it and junking half). Congrats on the binkiebanishing.

[Lisa]

Ha! Ha! Ha!

I suspected you were going to get it for that because I've seen it happen to others on other blogs. What an issue to take up so passionately!

There is just as much stuff about the damage of binkies and teeth as thumb sucking. What's up with the teeth issues, anyway? I think it is a ploy to get parents to get their kids to the dentist earlier.

FWIW, My pediatrician recommended ditching the binkie and letting them find their fingers because it worked with his kids and most of the kids he sees do not have a thumbsucking issue for long. Most kids stop naturally and those who need a bit of encouragement would have probably needed a bit with the binkie as well.

[Sue]

I STILL suck my thumb in times of dire need. I did regularly until my early-mid teen years and I suspect occasionally in college though by that time I was a total closet case.

I blame my delay in getting over on it precisely on braces-phobic parents and grandparents. I actually could have used braces but never got them anyway, so why all the fuss? (I also think braces are overdone in this day and age, spurred on by unrealistic expectations of Hollywood teeth.)

My kid LOVES her thumb. One morning she held it up in the air, glistening from her saliva and said "My thumb every day!" And so it is. Another time, she wanted me to cuddle her as she was falling asleep and she told me that I too should suck my thumb. I declined and she said, "Why not? It's good exercise." And so it is.

I absolutely love watching her try to find her thumb in a dead sleep. I always think of a film I once saw of a baby kangaroo, just after it was born, trying to find its mommy's pouch

Interestingly, I think she's somehow got sleep and her thumb completely associated and only sucks it in the daytime when she is nodding off for a nap.

What I hate is seeing parents repeatedly stuffing binkies into babies' and toddlers' mouths, when they aren't even asking for them. I judge those parents. Silently of course.

[Melessa]

I'm glad to hear the binkie-banishment went well. I also wish I had your way with words in the Katrina-related posts that followed. Oh, and I had to LOL at you putting those online MIL's in their place. Good for you!

[halloweenlover]

I went back to the binkie comments and cracked up. The tskers have to be kidding, right?

Who are we to question you? You are fantastic mom and mama, no questioning here.

[Rae]

*laughing* Wow. You are pig-headed aren't you?
Tried to take my toddler's binky this weekend. She pulled her hair out and bit her arm while she kicked me and screamed like I was killing her. Glad you had an easy go at it. My child is going to take her binky to school with her. We plan on getting binky's with school colors. Maybe a white one when she gets married?
It may be a piece of plastic and not part of her body, but my baby and her binky......they'll be best friends forever. *shrug*
Rae