Feel awful, just noticed ds3 has a dummy circle around her teeth

[Ghostsgowoooh]

It's quite large, I feel bad. She's always had a dummy and she's always been a bit of a whingy, difficult to settle and at the age of two, has it in quite a bit as she has awful tantrums and a dummy was the only thing to calm her down. It hasn't been in constantly and there are days where she doesn't have it except at night. But it's still too much isn't it, the damage has been done.

Her speech seems ok, she's a real chatterbox but I'm worried that she is damaged for life

My other 3 had dummies until 3 and 5 and no problems. No speech difficulties or dodgy teeth but its too late for dd3

Please don't be horrible, I already know I'm a shit parent.:(

its only her baby teeth though so hopefully she will be finished with the dummy by the time her permanent teeth come in. My sisters lo's all had dummies until just before they started school and their teeth and speech are all fine. You are not a shit parent.

Do you mean a gap when she bites together?
My DS2 had that when we got rid of his dummy at 4. Now 5 and you'd never know. The teeth just grew down more and straightened out a bit over time.

Thank you both. Yes I do mean the gap between her bite. I've been reading up on stuff and everything suggests that dummies cause many orthodontic problems due to the bite but its reassuring to know I may not have done permanent damage.

I think it's time I slowly weaned her off the dummy. She hasn't had it at all since 1 pm and she can have it for bed

I had goofy teeth from sucking my thumb til age 7 but apparently thumbs are worse cos you are putting the weight of your arm on your mouth. Whereas a dummy is light.

Be glad she doesn't suck her thumb.

According to my dentist so long as you lose it before adult teeth come in, things can and will reset themselves.

But if you're really worried, go cold turkey on it. Just take it away and put up with the tantrums for a few days.

Personally, I won't do that to my son.

I would not worry too much a lot of my friends dc have dummies and they are all either 3 or nearly 3. Like others have said her teeth will prob grow back but even if not they are only milk teeth. We are on day 4 of no dummy after DS left it for Father Christmas. The first two nights were quite bad but he seems to have accepted that FC has taken them now and mummy and daddy do not have them to give them back to him. My only fear is that I know there will be some dummies around the house we have not been able to find and so just hope we find them before he does.

None of mine have been thumbs suckers thankfully.
I'm not going to go cold turkey, but she isn't going to have it during the day, only at night. She hasn't had a bottle since about 18 months or so either, the dummy is the last thing to go

My ds aged 5 used to hide his in his pillow case, have a few crafty sucks then I would hear a kerfuffle as he tried to hide them after hearing me come up the stairs.

We went cold turkey on dd1 at 3, she coped quite well really

Hiya as a dental nurse I see this at work all the time. One mum actually attached the dummy to the baby's fav you then got rid of dummy, bear was still there so lo wasn't alone. 'Open bites' can affect speech( slight lisp) eating as its hard to bite with front teeth and a high palate. Usually the adult teeth with sort out some of the problem but there will still be a gap. To be honest braces won't sort it out, some cases need re-wired jaws etc. I know it's not ideal but using a dummy doesn't make you a bad parent. The dentist I work for uses a dummy on his daughter as its easier to wean off that than a thumb!