Gwen's a thumb-sucker. So far we've used several techniques to encourage her to stop this habit - verbal cues, taking away triggers (i.e. her blankie), tape, Mavala Stop (a polish used to stop nail biting and thumb sucking ; tastes disgusting!) - but Gwen always finds a way to still get that thumb in her mouth! I was pretty confidant the Mavala Stop would do the trick and for the first few hours it did, until Gwen pushed through the taste and sucked her thumb anyway. She is stubborn, that one.
Our latest attempt is underway as I type. I'm calling it "The Hand Sock". Basically, I just put a sock over her hand and arm and taped it. Then I put a long sleeve shirt on over it and wrapped tape around her wrist were the sock and shirt cuff meet. After a few minutes of screaming and failed attempts to get it off, she gave up and calmed down.
Now I know that she looks pretty sad in these pictures
(which were taken right as she conceded)
but she is now her happy self and seems to have forgotten about the hand sock.
I think this is it!
* fingers crossed *
She looks so sad in the pictures. Good for you for sticking to it. I think I would have given in.
ReplyDeleteWe are currently dealing with Mason chewing on ALL of his shirts. He has wrecked a few, and others are on the verge of being destroyed. We don't know how to get him to stop this......I hope this works for Gwen.....we never had thumb suckers. Just dealing with shirt chewers. Sigh....kids....
ReplyDeleteI was a thumb sucker when I was a kid... bad habit and hard to get rid of. But my mom used to put band-aids on my thumbs before bed and it was a reminder not to suck them. You have to get the fabric kind because those things are disgusting. Just another thing to try if your hand sock doesn't work (but I sure hope it does!)
ReplyDeleteMerr