Olivia has sucked her thumb since she was 3 months old. I have never known how I was going to break this terrible habit, but for whatever reason I thought I would wait until she turned 4 to buckle down and get her to stop. Luckily, we didn't have to wait that long!
Last week we had dental hygiene students at my work, educating our clients on the importance of oral health. I got the kids from preschool and took them back to work with me for a couple of hours. The sweet students talked with Olivia and gave her a new toothbrush. I explained to them that Olivia was going to have bad teeth from sucking her thumb. They then began to talk to her about why she shouldn't suck her thumb. They showed her a picture of a little boy with mal-formed gums and teeth from extensive thumb sucking.
On the way home our coversation went something like this:
O: "Mommy, I'm not going to have ugly teeth if I suck my thumb"
Me: "yes you will, princesses don't have ugly teeth."
O: " I don't want to have ugly teeth!"
Me: "Then don't suck your thumb"
We get home and she runs to Michael and tries to get him to get on her side. He didn't and he explained to her again about the ugly teeth.
That night when she got her Night Nights (her blankets that trigger the thumb sucking) she cried and and said " I want to suck my thumb!" but she wouldn't do it.
Since then, she hasn't sucked her thumb! I really didn't think that would break her of it but it scared her bad enough for her to stop. And it was pretty easy!
I told the dental students that if none of our clients learned a thing from them all week, it was still a success in my book because they broke my child of her awful habit!
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