For the Love of Sucking

My children love to suck. Aidan started sucking his finger when he was 12 months. We were in Florida and thought it was the funniest thing and once he discovered how to do it there was no turning back. (He has since released the middle finger from his nose.)
We talk about it daily and I would have thought that nearing 5 he would diminish this act but there seems to be no end in sight. So, when Bella came along I gave her a soother. Not sure if that was the right thing to do but 2 finger suckers seemed unimaginable. Now she is quite attached to the soother. If she really wants it and I don't give it to her she just begins to suck her finger as her brother does. She does not discriminate the suck. Smart girl.

I began researching sucking in children. I found an interesting article involving tribal cultures and how no finger sucking exists in these cultures. As long as the babies and children can suck at the nipple as freely as they wish, which they usually do until 7 yrs. old, then there is no need to finger suck. Well, being self employed my nipples had to come with me to work (even if it was only 2 half days per week) when my children were 4 months old. Yet, my children were fed on demand, nursed through the night and co-slept in their infancy.

Dr. Spock says " the main reason that young babies suck their thumbs seems to be that they haven't had enough sucking at the breast or bottle to satisfy their sucking needs". I do not agree with this statement for my kids as Aidan nursed for 18 months and I nursed him whenever he wanted during the day and in the night to help get back to sleep. Bella still nurses and she is 2.5 yrs.

There is a lot of information on sucking and its self soothing abilties as well as how emotional children need to suck to reduce anxiety levels. I can see this for Aidan but not as much for Bella. Let us remember that sucking is a natural instinct, a survival technique that babies are born with so they feed and survive. We seem to think that this primal instinct should disappear when our babies are 6 months old. In western culture we think at 6 months these tiny beings have reached a new milestone and that they should lose that need to suck, when in fact they are still very much babies.

Lastly, there is information about intelligence and the need to suck. How the sucking reflex stimulates brain development and thus raises the babies IQ's. I'll go with that theory!
Well for now, they love to suck (and they love each other!) and no matter how much we discuss it they are going to suck until they decide they are done with sucking. The bottom line is it is something I have no control over as I can't cut their fingers off.