I have been following the thumbs avidly since it concerns a point
in a pet research idea of mine, but I missed the beginning of the
discussion. At any rate, I would like to add my usual 2 cents.
I heartily second Denise. The range of "normal" behavior is quide
wide. Many of us are *born* needing more than others of whatever:
need for attention, contact, food, sucking. As I said before (but
can't remember in what context), we do the best we can as
mothers, not better than we can. Diane W.'s reply was also great,
especially about our Stone Age sisters. IMO, I strongly suspect
that thumbsucking breastfed babies/children are high-needs
people, and their moms should take off the hair shirts - their
kids' "unmet needs" can probably never be met since they are
too high to be met by breastfeeding, comfort nursing, family bed,
or anything and everything within the mother's capabilities.
There is nothing "wrong" with these kids and nothing "wrong" with
the mothers. Ooof! Why do we buy into the blame game?
BTW, this really messes up my research hypothesis. I had no idea
that there were longterm breastfed babies who sucked their
thumbs. Back to the drawing board.....Judy Knopf in Beer Sheva,
Israel, two cents shorter.