Love it or loathe it, the dummy has always had a place in the broader child-rearing debate.
While some research suggests that giving a baby a soother every time they are put down to sleep may reduce the risk of cot death, others argue it may delay language development.
Either way, it’s a very personal decision and one that every parent must make on their own. Like most big parenting conversations, it’s also one that strangers should keep out of.
That’s why one mum blogger was utterly gobsmacked when a stranger approached her with her baby son and pulled the dummy right out of his mouth.
Corissa Rieschieck, from Gippsland in Victoria, Australia, was at her local Woolworths when her toddler threw a run-of-the-mill tantrum. Once he’d calmed down, she handed him his dummy and carried on with her shopping.
Suddenly ‘out of nowhere’, an older woman appeared. And things began to get weird…
Writing on her blog, Corissa says:
“She reached out, promptly plucking the dummy out of the gremlin’s unsuspecting mouth while scolding me about how he doesn’t need it and I shouldn’t be so bad a parent as to give it to him.
Stunned silence (from both the gremlin and I) met this proclamation, though I suspect he was more stunned that a stranger had come near him and his precious dummy was suddenly gone than by anything that had been said.”
Before I had so much as attempted to gather myself to respond, the woman walked off with his dummy in hand!”
Seconds later, the stranger returned to admonish the mum (33) and her baby son again.:
“I’m not sure if it was the silence, the lack of any response, or the need to belittle me further that had her turning back, but just as suddenly she was approaching me again and her scolding recommenced.
This time it was along the lines of ‘what kind of parent did I think I was to be using a dummy’ and ‘I should know better, it’s no wonder he screams’.
Having reached me now, the dummy was pressed into my hand out of the gremlin’s line of sight. My – perhaps petulant – response was to promptly place it right back in his mouth. (To be perfectly honest, this thought makes me cringe now for I surely should have disinfected it first, but it was very satisfying to see her face as I did so).”
Having been shocked into silence by the incident, Corissa was furious with herself for not being able to react in time:
“By the time I had gathered my wits enough to respond at all, the woman I was most angry at was gone. Instead, the person who dealt with the brunt of my rage was my beautiful husband,” she writes.
Has a stranger ever made a rude comment about your child’s dummy? Let us know on Twitter @HerFamilydotie.
