Hello!

My 4 year old has sucked her thumb since she was 3 months old. We saw a dentist last year and he said that she is starting to do damage to her palate and that if I could get her to stop it would self correct. I’ve tried so many things with little success: reward charts, wearing gloves, nasty tasting nail polish. Any suggestions on how to get her to stop sucking her thumb?


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  • My 4 year old son is a thumb sucker but only to get himself to sleep and so not doing any damage. We’ve found when he’s had a band aid on it he can stop so it might be worth a try?


  • My daughter is 3 and she always sucks her thumb to comfort herself.. I am currently looking at the nail polish some have suggested. Thanks for the tip! I want to stop this desperately.


  • Sorry no advice here. My 8 month old suck her thumb when she need to go to sleep. I hope it won’t cause too much a problem! I tried giving her the dummy but she refuse to take it.


  • A friend puts nail polish on her kid because it tastes yuck and bandaids


  • I have an 8 year old who still sucks her thumb. We have managed to get her to stop a number of times for her to start up again. Placing band aids on the thumbs at key times of her sucking her thumb has worked the best so far. She decided that the No more Biting nail polish tasted delicious so that only lasted a day. We are currently trying to make her aware of everytime she does it so as she can actively stop herself. The next step is a metal plate from the dentist :(


  • Yep i agree, find the reason behind it. If it is just a comfort thing, try give her something else.
    The nail polish thing worked for my friends kid, it was a certain one though not just normal polish.
    Good luck


  • I agree with EllenG – find out the cause of the sucking and then you can address that and hopefully resolve the issue. My friend said she suffered a lot of anxiety as a child and sucked her thumb until well into primary school


  • My nephew at 4 years was told by his dentist he will need to wear braces if he continued to suck his thumb. He stopped sucking his thumb from that moment on!


  • When I was a child I had this problem. My parents promised me to do a massive room makeover if I proved I could stop for a certain amount of time. I achieved this (as it was something I desperately wanted) and never did it again. I do believe it is a self-soothing mechanism so maybe you could look up a bit of research on that and see if they give any good ideas. All the best!


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