Everybody told us she would out grow it.  That kids don’t enter college sucking on their fingers. She would start school and that would be the end of it.  Well, here we sit with less than two months of the school year to finish and my 7 year old is still sucking on her fingers.  Sigh.  The fingernails on her index finger and second digit have never grown.  She has divots at her first knuckle where her teeth rest.  But it was this latest bout of strep throat that finally did it.  She needed to stop.  It was a source for germ transmission and possible infection.

David: Lucy, it is time for you to stop sucking your fingers

Lucy: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

David: Baby, you need to listen to me.  You are ready to quit, the time has come. You are too big of a girl, and that is how you get germs and as a result sick.  However, I want YOU to make this decision, I don’t want to make it for you.  So, take some time to think about it and then come and tell me when you’re ready.

Me: And after a week of not sucking your fingers I’ll take you to Chuck E. Cheese.

Lucy: CHUCK E CHEESE? REALLY? CAN KATIE COME?

Me: Sure.

And that is how it started – part bribery, part inspiration.  As the week progressed there were a couple of emotional outbursts that were marked by Lucy whining at the top of her lungs “I CAN’T TAKE IT ANY LONGER!!!!!” But, even that was easily diverted by discussions of the forbidden Chuck E. Cheese.

It has been two weeks since we started this adventure with Lucy and she is now finger-sucking free. Her fingers are starting to heal and even she doesn’t think much about it any longer.  It seems so anti-climactic now. Honestly, if I knew it would be so easy I would have confronted the issue sooner.

And yet we have passed another childhood milestone – one more road marker towards adulthood.