Before I had Charlie, before I was pregnant with Charlie, before I was
even thinking about planning for Charlie, I had an uninformed opinion on
dummies. I went along with the hype that all they are used for is to stop
the baby crying, to shut the kid up, believed they were the cause of goofy
teeth, would be a nightmare to try and get the child to give up and have to
bribe them with toys, sweets, cold hard cash etc. Some people still have
this opinion and that is cool.
Then Charlie came along, so did colic, so did silent reflux, so did 23 hours
of screaming a day (I may have contributed to that total!). I’ll probably
do a separate post about Charlie's colic and reflux and the struggles we had,
even if it’s just to “type it out” as some sort of self-therapy session. I’ll go into details about it in that post
but just a taster as to how bad it was, I would have to have somebody help to
hold Charlie’s, screaming, bright red, violently moving head and clamp it onto
my nipple in order for him to be able to feed, he would feed CONSTANTLY yet
still scream, before he was even 2 weeks old he managed to commando crawl the
length of our bed as he was writhing in pain that much, he resembled a crazed
animal. So surreal and heart-breaking to see your new-born doing this.
I would pace the whole house, shushing like I’ve never shushed before, from
about 5pm till 2am, whilst he scratched my face as well as his own, in order
to get him to settle briefly enough to fall asleep. All 3 of us were exhausted, emotional, angry
and worried.
On the husband’s orders, I begrudgingly shoved a dummy into Charlie’s
gob.
Then the screaming fits, although they didn’t disappear, certainly
shortened, they calmed a bit, Charlie fed better, he started to act like a
normal human. We all got a bit of peace.
I was less worried to go out and about with this scary creature. I
started to enjoy him.
I’m not saying dummies are the answer to a medical condition, the must have
parenting tool or a definite thing to purchase, I also know that every parent
is different and if someone doesn’t want their baby to have a dummy, then that is
great too. Dummies won’t suit every baby,
and Charlie was still unsettled until we found the magic concoction of milk and
medicines that worked for him. But the
dummy helps to SOOTHE the baby, provides some comfort and takes their little
minds off the pain and uncomfortableness whilst they suck away on that little
pacifier, if only for a short time.
Plus, they look so cute!
My fave soothers for Charlie are the Avent ones (2 in a pack) , they do cute trendy designs, the night time ones GLOW IN THE DARK!! and every dummy comes with a protective cap so they are hygienic and safe to carry about with you. I get them when Asda do the 2 for £6 offer.
Has anyone had a similar experience? Did anyone think the same as me? Has
anyone had their opinion changed on anything else after having children?
xx
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