No silence is as golden as the one that descends when a fretful baby suddenly calms down. One moment he's bawling his socks off, the next you can hear a pin drop. Pop his dummy in and he's at peace with the world.
‘A dummy is an instant calmer,' says Angela Fifer, a scientist, from Nottingham. ‘It soothes a distressed baby and gives you time to work out what the cause of the upset is. I feel something is missing now if I go out without a couple in my pocket.'
Before she had her first baby, Angela, a 36-year-old mother of four, was adamant that she wouldn't give her child a dummy or soother. But on the way home from the hospital, after giving birth, she decided to buy one for her daughter, Helen, and she hasn't looked back since.
‘When I was in hospital, Helen was feeding and sucking on me all the time which made me quite sore,' remembers Angela. ‘It was the midwife who suggested I buy her a soother. I used to frown on dummies but that's all changed.'
Just over a year later when her son Jonathan was born, Angela bought a supply of soothers in preparation. And when twins Louise and Andrew came along there was never any doubt that they too would be given dummies - even though Louise took a while to get used to hers.
‘I persisted because a dummy was helpful in settling the others,' explains Angela.
She began restricting dummies to bedtimes and naps for Helen and Jonathan when they were between one and two years old. Both were weaned off them relatively painlessly when they moved into beds.
Babies can be divided into two groups - those who soothe themselves and those who don't, says Nottingham child psychologist Professor John Pearce.
‘Dummies and thumbs have a calming effect partly because if a baby has something in his mouth he can't cry, and partly because the mouth is linked with comfort,' he explains. ‘It's connected with enjoyable things like food and cuddles. The mouth is also the most sensitive part of the body in terms of nerve endings.'
Choose the right soother
If a dummy calms your baby, there's absolutely no reason he shouldn't have one. There's a huge range available, from ones that glow in the dark to those that rattle.
It's up to you whether you choose an orthodontic or standard teat, although some experts believe orthodontic soothers, which are shaped more like a nipple, simulate the action of breastfeeding and help strengthen mouth, tongue and jaw muscles. This may help oral cavity development and reduce the risk of overcrowded teeth.
You should take care to avoid problems with hygiene, safety, dental development and speech.
Soothers should be washed, sterilised and checked thoroughly before you give them to your baby, and you should replace a dummy every four weeks.
Store them in a dry, covered container out of sunlight, and never attach a dummy to a ribbon or pin as it puts your baby at risk of strangulation or other accidents.
‘Never dip dummies in sugary fluids,' warns David Rule, a consultant in paediatric dentistry. ‘It's been directly associated with tooth decay.'
He advises parents to scale down dummy use once a child is a year old. ‘If it's sucked a lot it can lead to an open bite where the teeth do not come together at the front. That's likely to produce a slight lisp,' he explains. But most children have ditched dummies by the time their second set of teeth come through, between seven and eight years old.
Of course, it's much easier to wean children off dummies than thumbs, and it's a good idea to try to cut down on sucking or to restrict it to bedtime by the time your baby starts to talk.
‘You can't communicate if you have something in your mouth,' explains Professor Pearce. ‘And there's a tendency for dummies or thumbs to get in the way of speech, unless your baby only has it in at night. But there are no particular problems with dummies or thumbsucking as long as it doesn't go on too long.'
