The Barrons: Sweet thumb sucker….

When Brayden was a brand new baby I gave in and gave him a paci to soothe him. I had a love/hate relationship with that paci and spent my nights putting it back in Brayden's mouth after it popped out repeatedly and he cried for it. Finally after about six months of sleep deprivation we decided to take the paci away. I hoped and prayed he would find a finger to suck and low and behold he did! Brayden started sucking his thumb pretty soon after we took the paci away and it automatically helped soothe him when he was upset or tired and helped him to get a better night's sleep as well. Not to mention that I thought it was pretty adorable the way he sucked and hooked his pointer finger.

Well almost six months ago I took Brayden to the dentist for the first time and the dentist asked me if he sucked his thumb all day and all night because that is what his teeth look like…I told her that he mainly just sucks when he is sleeping, tired, or upset. Seriously, if he was upset and crying all we would have to do is say "find your thumb" he would pop it in his mouth, lay his head on our shoulder and be fine. Anyway, the dentist proceeded to tell me that we needed to try and get Brayden to stop sucking before the age of three otherwise he would need a palette expander, and more expensive painful dental work to get his teeth and mouth straightened out. Ouch!

I don't do very well with change and I was dreading the thought of making our poor sweet boy stop sucking his thumb that very obviously soothed and comforted him. Brian and I agreed that we would give Brayden a little bit of time to adjust to starting school and we would start in October mentioning that he should stop sucking. Well our Brayden makes every thing easier than we could have ever thought, I seriously don't give him enough credit. I expected tears and a long drawn out and painful process. We casually mentioned to Brayden a couple of times in passing that he should take his thumb out and that he should stop sucking his thumb. We told him that he had an owie on his thumb (a callus) from sucking and that he should stop. Then Brayden spent the night at his GaGa and PaPa's house and GaGa also mentioned to him playfully that he should take his thumb out of his mouth….well that's all it took! Brayden came home and we never saw him suck his thumb again. He would even say "I don't suck my thumb" and "I don't want to get an owie". For a couple of weeks we noticed that he would kind of chew on his hand and gnaw on his knuckles like he wanted to suck but wouldn't but that soon went away as well.

I'll admit there are times now when he is screaming crying or throwing a fit that I wish I could just tell him to find his thumb and lay his little head on my shoulder :( but our buddy is getting older and amazingly his teeth are already starting to straighten out on their own!!!:) After going back to look for thumb sucking pictures I did realize that recently he had started sucking more and more as he was getting older and it was probably good that we stopped the habit when we did.

So…. here is a little tribute to our sweet Brayden and his journey of thumb sucking: