Teething and Parenting

My baby among many firsts, has learned to bite anything that makes the mistake of getting close to her mouth. This would have been no issue if this biting was done on inanimate objects but it’s soft human parts that she aims for, without warning she can dive for your neck, stomach, hand e.t.c when you are playing with her and when she hold’s on, it takes the grace of God to get her to let go. The teeth are so new and pointy that I and her siblings have found ourselves screaming and crying from the pain.

I noticed something though, whenever she starts biting and I scream or pull, she bites down harder while smiling but when you pretend and look away like its no big deal, she loses interest and let go. Meaning the more reaction surrounds her biting the more interesting it is and vice versa. Both are painful but one is shorter pain.

Since you can not avoid the teeth totally, you have the choice of reacting to the pain and prolonging the torture or holding your reaction for few seconds so you can reduce the level of harm(I am not exaggerating, there’s a scar on my neck like vampire mark, leg, thigh, stomach and so on…funnily she doesn’t bite while breastfeeding)

Few days ago, it suddenly clicked in my mind, this is like parenting. From my experience in parenting, children want to explore things more when much dust is raised concerning an it but when you take time to explain and don’t make much ruckus(aka shouting/nagging/beating), they lose interest and move on to other things.

In parenting, self-control is a key… Use it