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Dummies????

That's people for you - get 100 people in a room and you will probably get 100 different opinions.... :dohh:

(so there is another subject to add to the "taboo" conversation list? Politics, religion and dummies? :haha: )

Do what is right for you and your child and ignore everyone else. :winkwink:

QT

:rofl:

Yeah and in our family "second hand goods" is also added to that list. when I mentioned buying some stuff off ebay OHs family acted as though I wanted to put the baby into care of a wild animal whilst I ran off to vegas with a pimp to be a stripper.

The problem is I don't know what's best for me and because people are SOOO keen for EVERYONE to act out their own ideals because it validates them in some lame ass way that I'm going to get all these opinions thrust on me and emotional baggage that I'd really rather not deal with.
 
redpoppy, just do what you feel is best :) You could always buy some dummies the closer to nature ones QT mentions are suposed to be the best) and use them if you feel you want too and if not....well it doesnt matter does it?
I have strong feelings about dummies and abuot whether my children will use them but I wouldnt try and force it on anyone (though I express my opinion clearly when asked...hehe!)

To answer the other question asked No, I didnt find it difficult to not use dummies. It was easy, I never felt the need for one. I just worked through the unsettled times (there are always the times when teething, poorly etc gets to them) and didnt feel the need to resort to putting a dummy in their mouths.
As said above you could always get some and have them there so that if you feel you need/want them they are there to use and if you dont then you are fine.
 
My daughter had one until she was almost 2. I was also told that at least with the dummy, I could take it away, where if she got stuck on her thumb, it was permanently attached!

The Christmas before my daughter's birthday, we told her that Santa Claus was going to come to our house with her new presents and he was going to deliver her dummies to new babies for Christmas. It worked beautifully! She never asked for one again and has never had a problem falling asleep without it since.

I agree with Amber's Mum above that the dummy was wonderful to help my daughter get through her many many ear infections.
 
redpoppy, just do what you feel is best :) You could always buy some dummies the closer to nature ones QT mentions are suposed to be the best) and use them if you feel you want too and if not....well it doesnt matter does it?
I have strong feelings about dummies and abuot whether my children will use them but I wouldnt try and force it on anyone (though I express my opinion clearly when asked...hehe!)

To answer the other question asked No, I didnt find it difficult to not use dummies. It was easy, I never felt the need for one. I just worked through the unsettled times (there are always the times when teething, poorly etc gets to them) and didnt feel the need to resort to putting a dummy in their mouths.
As said above you could always get some and have them there so that if you feel you need/want them they are there to use and if you dont then you are fine.

Thanks :thumbup: But really now i'm thinking about it, why are people so negative about dummies? As in, I actually don't know. If i had some idea then I suppose I could make a clearer decision for me. Why are you dead against them for your own?
 
Yeah and in our family "second hand goods" is also added to that list. when I mentioned buying some stuff off ebay OHs family acted as though I wanted to put the baby into care of a wild animal whilst I ran off to vegas with a pimp to be a stripper.

Probably similar to shen my mother-in-law found out that I was still going to the gym during pregnancy? I would honestly be tied to my bed with 24 hour obstetrician care if she had her way... :dohh:.

The problem is I don't know what's best for me and because people are SOOO keen for EVERYONE to act out their own ideals because it validates them in some lame ass way that I'm going to get all these opinions thrust on me and emotional baggage that I'd really rather not deal with.

They mean well - EVERYONE means well (well 99% of people). They all care about you and your baby and want to help you make the best choice (at least that is what I try to tell myself when opinions get pushed at me :haha: ). You just have to think it all through and work out what is best for you and your baby, then - once you have decided - ignore everyone :winkwink:.

QT
 
I didn't with Charlotte as I hate them and hadn't planed to this time but with the possible reduced risk of cot death I have changed my mind and hope to use one ASAP!
 
i used them, i see it as its easier to take away than a thumb. and now she is off them which took a few days of grumpy mya but now she is dummy free and doesnt suck her thumb lol
 
Thanks :thumbup: But really now i'm thinking about it, why are people so negative about dummies? As in, I actually don't know. If i had some idea then I suppose I could make a clearer decision for me. Why are you dead against them for your own?

From what I can gather (my Mum was very anti-dummy and from reading around) some of the reasons are:
- if you stick a dummy in a child's mouth every time it cries, then you are solving the outcome and not the cause. Wouldn't it be better to try to find out the problem and solve the problem for your child?
- yes, it doesn't look good (especially on older toddlers or 11 year olds :winkwink: ).
- you have to be careful about the hygiene - many women are (and are religious about disinfecting them etc), but when you aren't looking (especially in the garden) then goodness knows what it can fall into before being popped straight back into toddler's mouth.... :wacko:
- concerns about "weaning" a child off of a dummy...

I don't think that using a dummy is a problem, but it depends how you use it... (if that makes sense). Ok, you could say that all of the above are common sense, but some parents wouldn't really think them through...

QT
 
That could be long redpoppy!!
I am actually more against them because a child can become reliant on a "false" soother. Having seen and known children become dependant on thier dummies to be able to settle/sleep for years and years and literally be unable to settle/sleep without it seems very very wrong to me that a child should depend so strongly on any object or motion that isnt "real"....a child should learn to be able to comfort themselves, be content and happy enough to be capable of settling and sleeping independantly. For example stories of children waking up in the night and screaming until a dummy is replaced is something I would wish to avoid at all costs, how do you know if something is wrong or not? What if they are hungry but the sucking puts them back to sleep? Did I want a child who had to be weaned off a dummy at some point and go through all the deal of training a child to sleep twice?
A dummy can become a crutch for the child in other activities too, having a dummy in their mouth can also encourage them to be less vocal (if you are allowing them to have a dummy past 1 year old) as they have to remove the dummy to be able to speak clearly, some children become so attached to dummies they will not take it out to speak, therefore thier speech can become delayed. That wont always happen but its a worry I personal had especially after living with a 2yr old who had a dummy in her mouth a lot and barely spoke until all her dummies were removed (and boy was that a few weeks of screaming!!!)

Hoping that makes sense, if not I can try and be more specific and elaborate? Course its just my personal view, I feel the same way about blankies, thumbs in mouths and motions such as rocking, headbanging and so on.
 
No that makes a lot of sense :thumbup: but I suppose sometimes, for example if the baby has colic for a long time, maybe a dummy is better to soothe the baby than the baby just crying endlessly because its not used to having a digestive system?

As for all artificial soothers, how do you actually go about preventing a kid from sucking his or her thumb/rocking etc? And I ask sincerely as I obviously don't have the child psychology knowledge.
 
Im wanting to breast feed plus i also think the baby cant be wanting or missing out on something it has never had before.

The only thing aswell about them having them thru the night is they will wake up crying if it falls out!!!!! so you could be up and down more times than needed just for the dummy!!!
Im steering well clear i think!!!!

xxx

this happened with amber, more of just a phase, tbh, up anyways doing night feeds lol.


Like i said this is my first so im purely going by hear say..
My friend whos lad is one this week mentioned a few weeks ago that her lad wasnt sleeping thru the night anymore, he had been from about 6 weeks. She said all he wants is his dummy putting back in, then goes straight back off to sleep.

i think this thread proves like everything else every baby is different.

thanks
 
:rofl:Now I have heard a nasty rumer that childeren cry and cry....and cry :breath:

even when there is no problem :rofl: some causes are I need to streth my lungs :hissy: :rofl:

I know a girl whos 9 month old baby. no dummy, wakes up in the night and screams and screams and so she goes through latches on has 3 sucks and is away again and this is happening 2-3 times a night like a human dummy some kids like the sucking sensation and are not necessarily hungry, also taking up anothersquishes theory I if a baby is happy to go to sleep sucking a dummy is it really needing fed again anyway surely hunger is more primal than that?? :angel:
 
But if a child has colic for a long time there are other ways to soothe the child than use a dummy. My son was colicy for a while like any other baby can be and we worked through that with no dummy and I would not us my breast as comfort either (easy to do but hard to fix!) He was never left to cry with no soothing but there are things you can do for colic than use a dummy. Same for teething etc etc. Also if a child is colicy or crying excessively for long periods there could be something underlying, extreme cases of colic resulting in prolonged crying need medical attention....so a dummy would be useless....you want to deal with the problem not solve the crying until the baby was in too much pain to even have the dummy.

On that one geekone, Id mostly agree BUT.....people (especially babies and children) can have learned responses to stimulus. For example you can "train" a child to fall asleep when a certain song is played or sung or when a certain blanket is used. In the same way a child can have a learned behaviour of falling asleep if a dummy is put back in thier mouth if they have woken from sleep. So maybe the child was hungry but the learned behaviour countered the hunger...the baby may cluster feed in the morning (potentially resulting in grumpy baby, reflux, colic) there was a study on this I read when I was pregnant with my son....I will have to go try find it as its really interesting!
 
On that one geekone, Id mostly agree BUT.....people (especially babies and children) can have learned responses to stimulus. For example you can "train" a child to fall asleep when a certain song is played or sung or when a certain blanket is used. In the same way a child can have a learned behaviour of falling asleep if a dummy is put back in thier mouth if they have woken from sleep. So maybe the child was hungry but the learned behaviour countered the hunger...the baby may cluster feed in the morning (potentially resulting in grumpy baby, reflux, colic) there was a study on this I read when I was pregnant with my son....I will have to go try find it as its really interesting!

Sounds interesting

BTW I love the thought of training my child to fall asleep when it hears a certain song brilliant I could hypnotise my child to be as lovely as possible and when it is older a certain song to make it do the dishes what do you think :rofl::rofl::rofl:

Seriously though I would be interested in reading the article :) :hugs:
 
Ill try and find it...no promised though it was 6 years ago now...Ive lost a lot of brain cells since then!!

Seriously though you can "teach" a baby to fall asleep to a song/tune or whatever you want. Its another thread but its very possible...however you are relying on the same "false" settler as you would with a dummy....unless you want a child that can only ever sleep when a certain song is played/sung....hmmmmm!!!!
 
It always stuns me how some people have such strong views on dummies.
Essentially,you have to do what is best for you and your baby.
I would have had no problem using one with Ophelia but she never took to them :shrug: For me,one of the main factors I considered when deciding whether or not to give Ophelia a dummy was the SIDS research on them.. (Its here if you havent read about it before https://www.askbaby.com/dummies-sids.htm )
xxxxx
 
Seriously though you can "teach" a baby to fall asleep to a song/tune or whatever you want. Its another thread but its very possible...however you are relying on the same "false" settler as you would with a dummy....unless you want a child that can only ever sleep when a certain song is played/sung....hmmmmm!!!!


yeah I think that's true as I baby sat for a week for the MOST docile and gorgeous and cute blonde little baby girl when I lived in LA and ALL you had to do to put her to sleep was stick her in her cot and put on this lame hippy "sounds of the sea" cd.

She'd put herself to sleep.

It was DAMN impressive.

As for washing dishes geekone, I like your idea :winkwink: how shall we set about such a task?

Another question squish (slightly OT sorry!):
And this is one I assume I'll learn or someone will tell me but that I do find quite daunting: How do you know when the baby has colic or when its genuinely hungry? Like when you said you wouldn't give your baby your breast for comfort, how did you know it didn't need it? :shrug:

I find the thought of a colicy baby quite scary. I actually didn't know what colic was till last week.:blush: :shock: I know that's stupid but the thought of a baby crying for weeks or months with no particular reason is very VERY daunting :cry:
 
Wow i love this thread.

I have a few examples of dummy use -

One was me, my brother and sister, my mum didnt give any of us dummies apart from when we were really really really little, none of us took to them and none of us were bothered when she threw them away (with me it was actually my mums FRIENDwho chucked a dummy in my mouth - my mum was mad but waited to see what happened after a few days). My sister didnt take to the dummy she just spat it out, BUT she sucked her thumb and did so till she was about 6 i think, i dont see anything wrong with thumb sucking i prefer it actually.

Next is an old friend, She was 21 when she had her daughter and she hated dummies said she would never use them (she saw her neice and nephew with them all the time), and true to her word she never bought one or tried one. But now i was over there a lot inn the first year, and she would cry! It takes a while to recognise all the different 'cries' but once you do and you can idtentify whats wrong thru the cry it makes it a bit easier, but then still, going into another room to do the dishes or washing while shes in her rocker crying is hard. But she taught her to soothe herself and in the end did. she would cry to sleep but we knew nothing was wrong and she wasnt hurt..

Next example - the little girl my friend used to nanny. She was 3 and she had a dummy in 24/7. everytime i saw her, But me and my frind decided we would wean her. When i saw her i used to sneak it away while i was talking to her or playing and she wouldnt notice for ages and ages. When she wanted it thougt she made it VERY clear. She had FASD aswell which is why her dad spoiled her, but in their house there was about 5 or 6 dummies lying around so even if you took it - she would go off and find another. and she knew as soon as her dad got home he would give her one. Not much we could do tho, as nannies. We tried. Her teeth formed different and she didnt reaslly speak much unless she wanted something. thats what i dont agree with about dummies,

But, in saying that, i will probably use one after BF'ing is established. Purely because i simply cant pick her up everytime she cries to soothe her and also for SIDS. But my baby will NOT have a dummy past 1 year and will not have it during the day for no reason. Im quite anti that. It will be for naps and sleeping and thats it!

The little baby i used to nanny, she had one. Well 2. but she only got them for naps and sleeping, I got her wweaned off them completely when i was therem she used to nap in her mums bed with a dummy but i got her into her own cot and without dummy. So some days she only wanted it to sleep at nighttime. We put it in her cot nap time aswell though. When we picked her up after nap - the summy stayed there. Yes sometimes we had to go up and check why she was crying during the night and if we put the dummy back in then she went to sleep, i think thats fine though because if she was really hungry she would spit it out and scream. So we could tell.

So i think it really really does depend on the baby, and if i am lucky enough not to have a 'cryish' baby, then i might not even try dummies. Once the baby is here you can decide better, I will buy 2 for the house. and thats it. if they get lost then they are gone!

also with the sterilising thing yeah obv ill clean them but im not gonna worry too much about if they drop it themselves then put it back in, i wont have any pets and unless its outside itll be ok.The baby has to build up an immune system.

Thats my views on dummies! :D my this is a long post! sorrry!!
 
I've never given Marley a dummy, and he is such a happy, content baby!

And as anothersquish said, I have seen sooo many toddlers with speech delays due to dummies, a 2 yr old I used to babysit would always have her dummy in and when it was out she was soooooo shy, wouldn't say a word. And when it was in you couldn't understand a word she said! My 18 mo. old niece, same thing..only she screams and throws her self on he floor (literally) when her dummy is out. :shock: NOT something I want to deal with, thanks!
 

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