Where is Thumbkin? (Breaking the Habit of Thumb-Sucking)

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If you would’ve asked me that question three weeks ago I would have said, “in my daughter’s mouth.” That’s right Ladies and Gentlemen: I am the parent of a thumb sucker…well, actually as of three weeks ago, former thumb-sucker. Thanks to a friend we found the answer to this particular problem in the form of Dr. Thumb.

thumb box

The Diagnosis

My daughter has been a thumb-sucker since the womb. She was suckling that digit in every single ultra sound and 3-D picture we took, and frequently repeated the same performance outside the womb. Being a former thumb-sucker myself, I really didn’t think it was a big deal. It soothed her and I felt that she would give it up when she was ready, so I put the whole thumb thing on the backburner. However, now that our daughter is quickly approaching her third birthday my husband and I decided that we needed to try and wean her off of this habit.

Where is Thumbkin? :: RGV Moms BlogThe Symptoms

There are several reasons why we decided to give this a try.

  • More frequent thumb sucking. Our daughter use to only suck her thumb when she was upset or tired, but she was now sucking her thumb almost all the time whether at home, the grocery store or at school.
  • Illness. She was getting sick more frequently since her wet little thumb would pick up germs wherever we went before promptly popping her digit back into her mouth.
  • Hindered speech. Our sweet girl is quite the talker and it became more and more obvious to us that her speech was being affected.
  • Sore thumb. Her thumb would get all pink and wrinkly from time to time due to her constant sucking…luckily she never got an infection, but I could tell it sometimes got a little uncomfortable.

The Treatment Plan

So, the decision was made but the question still remained, “how do we get her to stop sucking her thumb?”

The answer? Dr. Thumb! A parent from our daughter’s gym class was experiencing the same thing we were with her own daughter and had discovered Dr. Thumb on Amazon. Here’s what it is:

thumb device

It’s a non-toxic, soft silicone guard worn by the child for at least two weeks. The thumb guard is perforated and therefore prevents suction. The wonderful thing about this device is that it comes in two sizes and can be used on either hand and according to the information on the box had a 92% success rate and was gentle and natural. SOLD!

The Medicine

We debated whether to explain to our two year old what this contraption was before or after it was on. We opted for after because we felt like if she heard the words “stop sucking your thumb” she would have bolted. We did however, explain it to her after we put it on and the initial fascination of her new “special bracelet” had worn off. I’m not going to lie the first day was a little on the rough side, but by keeping busy and having plenty of distractions on hand we made it through the first day and night. Day two was a little better with fewer tears and by day three she had accepted that Dr. Thumb wasn’t going anywhere. I took comfort in that the device was nice and soft, not at all rough or hard, and I was especially pleased to discover how pliable and flexible the guard was allowing my very active daughter to remain active. Putting Dr. Thumb on and taking it off was easy, which I only did for cleaning purposes.

thumb crop

Our daughter wore her thumb guard 24/7 for two weeks straight. She ate, slept, bathed, crafted, exercised, went to school and played with that thing on and it didn’t interfere with her day-to-day activities.

Complications

I really can’t say that we had any. I will say that our daughter was able to wriggle her thumb out a couple of times, but that was probably because we kept her wristband a little loose. But even when she did get her thumb out she never sucked on it – and it only occurred twice (at least to my knowledge) 🙂

The Results

It worked! After two weeks we removed the guard and our daughter no longer sucks her thumb 🙂 She’s happy and we’re happy that we were able to break this habit in a gentle manner.

 If you have a thumb-sucker on your hands I would highly recommend Dr. Thumb and the sooner the better. It’s gentle, affective, soft, pliable, and easy to use. This mom gives Dr. Thumb two thumbs up :)!

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Stephanie Cullum
Hey y’all! My name is Stephanie, a stay-at-home mommy, former teacher, Gemini, lover of books, quirky shoes, jeans (I own like twenty of them), coffee, travel and good food…oh and I’m also a wife and mother to my one and only daughter – she’s two and cute as a button! I’m half American and half German, born in Argentina, and grew up in Germany, Hong Kong and Singapore before moving to Dallas to go to college (go SMU). Needless to say I’m not a native to the Rio Grande Valley, but my husband is. He enticed me down here with the promise of good Mexican food, beaches, and close proximity to a foreign country – so here we are six years later and I couldn’t be happier calling the RGV home!

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