What Would You Do - Daycare Lady "Knocks" Daughters Thumb Out of Her Mouth

It's inappropriate to have her do this when you're holding her. It's totally disrespectful. I wouldn't want my daycare provider doing this to my child, period. It seems cruel to me for someone to treat her this way for that. Thumb sucking isn't misbehavior. Do people slap cigarettes out of people's mouths because it's a bad habit? I'd like to but I wouldn't dare.

You have said SLAP and KNOCKED, and you have said nothing. Could you mean TAKES the thumb out? I ask because If I saw anyone slapping or knocking something out of my child's mouth, they better be running!

Blessings....

If anyone slapped anything on either of my kids it would not be ok with me and she would be told so!

I am a daycare provider, and I don't take it upon myself to stop these kinds of behaviors. She should have had a conversation with you about this prior to doing anything about your daughter's thumb sucking. That would have given you a chance to agree or disagree with he method she's using. And for you to be consistent at home and at daycare which is always a better transition for kids.

The method she's using isn't kind to your daughter, and I would say something. You can tell her that you appreciate and agree that it's a good time to wean your daughter from her thumb sucking, but that you'd like it if she would be more gentle about it. She can remove her thumb from her mouth without slapping it out of her mouth.

My son sucked his thumb until he was 5. He gradually weaned himself from it and in the end was only doing it at night to go to sleep. We did have to remind him to take it out of his mouth and gently remove it from his mouth to get him to completely stop, and I'll tell you, that it was hard for him. It's such a comforting thing to them, even gently taking away is hard. It would fry my bacon if a provider was slapping it away.

Protection of our children is our responsibility as parents. This is inappropriate behavior on the part of your day care provider and should be corrected. If she argues with you, consider finding another place for your daughter. Children need to be treated gently and with respect. This method she is using to stop the thumbsucking is counter productive. Thumbsucking is often to comfort or soothe and your provider's actions are likely to make the child more insecure as she may feel fearful and threatened. This will likely increase the desire for your daughter to suck her thumb. My pediatrician says the more attention called to an undesirable habit, the more likely it will persist. I highly encourage you not to focus too much on her thumb -sucking and focus more on making sure your daughter is safe and secure especially when you are not present.

Your daycare woman sounds as habitual as your daughter, but her habit is to "correct." I'm sure different moms will have different takes on what sorts of correction are okay. For me, this is not a caring or respectful way to treat a child, and I would care very much if this were happening even during the day when I wasn't there.

It seems quite reasonable, to me, to ask a caretaker to change a habitual response, not by just telling her not to do it, but by acknowledging the value of what she's trying to accomplish, telling her how you feel when you see it happening, and suggesting an alternative action.

For example, "Miss Jean, I want you to know I appreciate your willingness to help Suzi stop thumbsucking. I feel upset when you slap her hand away, though, because to me, that's just not necessary or respectful. I would like you to just take her hand away from her mouth instead of slapping it away. Will you please make an effort to do it that way in the future?"

If she's a smart lady, she will at least never let you see her do that to your child again.

If you did not ask the caregiver to watch out for this behavior, she has no authority to take on the task of stopping it! Your daughter is not her child. As for slapping your daughter's hand while in your arms, that is not right. I would have a talk with her about it and set boundaries for how YOU want to modify the thumb sucking.

Whether you see the daycare lady do it again or not is irrelevant, I would say to her the next time you drop your daughter off "Oh by the way, don't worry about her thumb sucking. I'm working on it. So if you see her do it, please ignore it so it won't be counterproductive to what I'm doing at home.".
That way you don't piss her off just before you drop off your daughter for the day and she does it anyway just because you've irritated her.
I don't think it is the daycare provider's responsibility to break my child of habits lke this.
It is your child, your call, your job.
Again, I would broach it nicely so she doesn't take it out on my child.
Your child is 3 not 10 sucking her thumb.
Sorry, I hope that helps.

Why wait. Just have the conversation. Tell her that the other day she swatted your daughter's hand away from her face and that you'd prefer her not to train her that way. Then come up with a better solution together.

You are the boss. Don't forget that.

I am not sure this is the sanity check you are looking for but, I think YOU are really wrong to have let this happen in or out of your presence. No one puts her hands on my child like that. I would have launched into a screaming tirade if anyone, even my spouce, slapped my daughter's hand out of her mouth. She disrespected you and your daughter. And I hate to think what else she might be doing when you aren't there. No way I would be using her one day longer.

Considering saying something? Are you also looking for new care?

We had a nanny for 3 weeks. During week 2 I was on travel for 3 days and in that time she decided to push my 4 year old. I found out the following Friday. She was fired that day. I wouldn't have cared if I had to take 2 weeks unpaid leave.

On the flip side, I was a nanny for a family who let their children use binki's until the age of 5. I stopped letting them use them around 2 when I was with them...and I hid them. It's a joke to this day still and the are still finding them - 8 years later. But I never laid a hand on their children and never would.

The first time something happens it can really catch us flat footed, can't it?

Add in when we really like/respect someone, and it can leave us questioning ourselves.

So don't feel badly, but do figure out how you want to handle things! Until then, it will be "No decision = a decision of it's own". :P

Whether or not it is during school or after school... you are the parent and you can say, what your wishes are and how they are handling the children while at school. Before/during/or after hours.

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Your childcare provider needs to kindly work with your child according to your wishes regardless of whether who’s on duty. I certainly would not tolerate any caregiver doing something like what you describe with my child. Since you have been with your provider for over a year now, I think you can be firm but frank.

I take this approach with our part time nanny so she knows when I mean business. We butted heads briefly when my little one started sucking his thumb. I told her in no uncertain terms not to discipline him about it. She tried once in my presence and I firmly reminded her not to do that. If she had done it again, I would look for another caregiver. As a reasonable parent if something bothers you, then you need to address the situation. Sometimes you'll be perceived as bitchy but the child is yours not hers.

She really needs to stop sucking her thumb... my neice's mouth is all messed up from it (misshapen (sp?)) and my brother has a hissy fit if you tell her to stop, even though he knows her mouth is being damaged by it.

As for the daycare worker, heck yea say something. Slapped ? I'd slap her!
I would take her off to the side when my kid wasn around.

Well, it sounds like you don't actually object to her treatment of your daughter? Just that she did it while you were there?

Personally for me any kind of slapping or hitting from a care provider is unacceptable and I know that any kind of physical discipline or "correction" is against licensing regulations in my state.

I would have pulled her on the spot and reported the woman to the licensing agency. I want to say that maybe I would just talk to her about changing what she is doing, but I don't think that I could trust her to take care of my child any longer after I knew that she slapped her.

So... personally, I think you are underreacting...

I get that for many reasons she is trying to help with the thumb sucking. Oftentimes we, as providers, can accomplish these things in a different time table than families can (I always ahve kids off nuks, bottles and such WAY WAY before parents...often simply due to our busy days, I can listen to a few days of tough love crying, and citing some sanitary issues, etc)

But never would I deem it ok to "knock" a childs hand away from their own face. I have had a few thumb-babies turned into thumby-older-monsterish addicts. But usually with ALOT of gentle persuasion, constant reminding that their thumb is just for sleepy time, or some other designated daytime place.

I would certainly have a non-confrontational conversation about this with your care provider. She can accomplish the goal of limited or no thumb sucking at HER place by using words, finger signals, etc. When you are not there, even gentle, touching the arm to physically remind her to remove it should be enough. I have even made children wash their hands over and over and ver if I see it too much. They jsut get tired of the focus on it if they are old enough.

Oh no, no, no. There are better ways to correct a 3 year old. Um, language comes to mind. "Oh Marcie, please take your thumb out of your mouth - you are a big girl now", or " Marcie, I know you are tired, but how about holding this cuddly lovey doll instead of sucking your thumb".

You get the idea. Talk to your day care provider about more positive ways to discourage your daughter from sucking her thumb. It is not being bitchy to ensure that your daughter is treated as you would treat her while she is at daycare.

I just don't like the idea of a child care working slapping a child anyplace on their body for any reason. Aren't we trying to teach kids not to hit? That is exactly what she's doing - hitting your child! Like another poster said, a simple touch on the arm to remind her or a reminder whispered in her ear should do it. She probably does it by habit and doesn't really realize she's putting her thumb in her mouth so a gentle reminder would probably work. I sucked my thumb until I was quite old and yes, my mouth is a mess! So I don't condone thumb/finger sucking and know first-hand how bad it can be, but again there is no justification for slapping a 2 year old anywhere anytime for any reason.

P.S. My mom used something called "Thumb" that was designed especially to stop thumb sucking. She put it on my thumb and when my thumb got wet, it burned. Unfortunately, it also burned when I washed my hands so once she put that on me, there was no handwashing! Probably not a good idea and I certainly don't recommend it for a 2 year old. I was much older. As much as I hated it, it did the trick!

Unless you mean REALLY slaps, I sort of wish someone helped my daughter stop sucking her fingers. God knows I dropped the ball. She's almost six, still sucking away, and her mouth shows it. It's an impossible habit to break now and I should have been firm when she was younger instead of thinking she'd outgrow it. Obviously I wouldn't let anyone slap my child though. But bat their fingers out? If I knew then what I know now, I would have been joining in batting them out!

If you have decided this is OK when you're NOT there, one way to totally avoid any confrontation is to do it yourself when you're there so she doesn't "feel the need". Or preemptively say, "That's OK I got it" if you see her attempt to do it. And if you don't ever want her doing it, then just say so. Otherwise, I'd let it be.

My cousins have 7 kids, the second wouldn't stop sucking her thumb, they ignored it, and she didn't quit for years, so every child after that, they batted out the fingers and thumbs out at the onset of the habit and it did prevent it from becoming a habit. Wish I had done that!

Whatever you decide in terms of thumb sucking, you and your daycare lady should be consistent in front of each other. It will only confuse your child if she does not allow thumb sucking, but as soon as you show up, you do allow it.

I would NOT like this.. She is "physically" putting her hands on your daughter.. My son is 5 and sucks his thumb when he goes to bed sometimes.. Although, I don't like it, he's MY CHILD!!!!
I would say (in the nicest way) "we are trying to get her to stop sucking her thumb at home, until we wean her off, I would appreciate it if you didn't knock her hand out of her mouth".... As much as I'd like to knock her hand for touching my child, she still watches her during the day.... Do you feel comfortable with her watching your daughter????

That definitely sounds odd, and I would be bothered as well, and like you probably afraid to say something. I think you got plenty of good advice on that though, but wanted to sugget trying Mavala Stop to help her break the habit. My son's dentist recommended it, and we followed the plan and he stopped. Before using it though, I would suggest talking to your daughter about it. She's still young, but see if you can get her on board with quitting. It will help make the process less 'painful' for everyone.

I bought mine on Amazon. Also read through the customer reviews for tips/suggestions (like not putting too much on her nails - a little goes a long way)

If she's really slapping or knocking your daughter's hand for this (or, well for anything without discussing with you how you want situations handled) - I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be thinking about when or how to bring it up with her, but would be finding my daughter a new daycare, like, TODAY.

you have to know that consistancy is the only thing that will "break" this habit and it's going to ruin her teeth and cause the need for braces.

Think of it this way.....If she is willing to slap your child in front of you. How far does she go when you are not around? I'd venture a guess your daughter gets more slaps than I would be comfortable with!

I don't understand the reluctance to say something to your daycare provider. I would respond with confidence and share a plan to enlist her to help stop the thumb sucking.