I was getting quite desperate as my child was approaching 2 years old, and she was still sucking her thumb before or while she sleeps. I read that a child’s thumb-sucking habit is considered serious if they suck their thumbs past 2nd birthday, and they would find it hard to break their thumb sucking habit. So I researched all the methods currently available that claim to reduce the thumb sucking habit, but found none suitable. Most of them seem ineffective. There was one that I was interested, but they use hypnotism to speak subconscious messages into the child. This makes us uncomfortable, as we are not sure what other kind of messages they might play in our child’s mind, apart from the message (to discourage thumb-sucking) that they claim to use.
So we decided to speak positive messages to our children every day on our own. Then one day, I had an idea. I was talking to a friend who said that she removed her child’s pacifier addiction by telling her that it dropped into the drain and couldn’t be retrieved. So the child had to give the pacifier up. It suddenly occurred to me that my child, by then, would not suck her thumb unless she had her favorite bolster with her favourite bolster cover. So I came up with a plan. I told everyone in the house, and our parents the plan, and they were supposed to co-orperate and stick with it. I knew things will be hard, and it would be tough fight, and we needed to be ready for the tantrums or whatever that she was going to kick up with, but I was determined to kick her thumb-sucking habit.
So that night, when she was going to sleep, and asked for her bolster, I told her that an insect has dirtied her bolster cover, and we had to wash it, but the cover couldn’t dry in time. She was sad, but had no choice, as she couldn’t sleep with a wet bolster. Then I distracted her by telling her one story after another, so that she would forget about her bolster, and eventually fell asleep when she was too tired. The first night was a success, I must say, and I was very pleased. She did wake up in the middle of the night (by that time I have already weaned her off the breast), but I hugged her and told her more stories to help her go back to sleep.
