ESTABLISHING TOILET HABITS
When baby reaches the age of three months, a regular systemized effort should be made to educate it to "habits of cleanliness." Nothing can be done in this direction previous to this age, as a child at that period of its life is scarcely conscious of the natural functions of its body. Each time a baby, after the third month, is making an effort to move its bowels, the nurse or mother should go to it as it lies in its crib, and talk to it by making a certain sound or say a certain word—whichever word or words you want to educate your child to say, when it wants to move its bowels. By constant attention and effort in this direction, a child with quick perception and initiative will soon associate the sound and the function, and it will begin to make the sound when the function is about to be performed. As soon as it begins to make this sound, if prior to the act of moving the bowels, the child should be immediately taken up and held on a chamber, into which some hot water has been put, and encouraged to relieve itself, the nurse or mother still repeating the sound, or word, or words.
Having successfully accomplished this programme a number of times, the child should be encouraged and petted every time it gives a satisfactory warning, and discouraged and reproved every time it wets or soils its napkin. A little later, say about six months, the child should be held on the chamber at a certain time each morning and evening, thus encouraging it to move its bowels regularly twice daily. The careful carrying out of a scheme such as the above will establish regular, cleanly habits, and will to a very large extent guard against constipation in the future.
Baby's Comforter.—The discovery and introduction of the comforter or rubber teat was an unfortunate episode in someone's life. By the careless, conscienceless nurse, or thoughtless mother, it is regarded as a real comfort and blessing. Any temporary comfort, however, which the nurse or mother may enjoy as a result of its use, is at the expense of the health of the child. Its use is a serious reflection upon the good intention and intelligence of the mother who permits her child to use one. It is a bad habit from every viewpoint possible. In order that mothers, open to conviction and capable of reasoning, may appreciate the character of the harm done by the use of the comforter, we will briefly record these conditions:
1st. The constant sucking pulls upon the delicate structures of the mouth and throat, and so impairs the health tone of these structures that they become flaccid and feebly nourished. This to a certain degree causes adenoids, enlarged tonsils, loose palate and weak throat, with the constant tendency to winter colds and coughs, and to catarrh.
2nd. It causes an excessive flow of saliva. Saliva should only be stimulated previous to stomach digestion. By causing an excessive flow of saliva into an empty stomach, the digestive powers are interfered with, and seriously weakened. Stomach trouble, and consequently intestinal disease, may therefore be caused by the seemingly innocent comforter.
3rd. A constantly used comforter always causes disease of the mouth. Mucous erosions, canker sores, little ulcers, etc., are produced in this way.
4th. The use of the comforter makes it impossible to put the child to sleep, or even to leave it alone, without first placing it in its mouth.
5th. To stifle a baby's cry, by pushing the comforter into its mouth, is as bad as giving it chloroform to mask a serious and dangerous pain. If may have a just reason for crying, as is explained elsewhere, and if that reason is not searched for and found, it may mean serious trouble later.
6th. Actual deformities of the mouth are produced by constant use of the comforter. The continuous sucking affects the gums, pushes them out of shape and position, and the teeth as a consequence come at wrong angles, thus causing unsightly deformities, which last throughout the life of the child.
7th. The worst fault of the comforter is to be found in its uncleanliness. We are quite satisfied that the use of the comforter will be legislated against one of these days. If preventive medicine means anything, it must certainly reckon with the comforter in the very near future. Have you ever watched your baby suck on its comforter? If you have, you must have noted the tireless energy with which it works its tiny jaws and tongue. Suddenly the comforter slips from the little mouth and baby begins to cry, attracting the attention of the mother, or nurse, or little sister, who promptly, recognizing the trouble, pounces on the offending comforter, which has fallen to the floor, and with a perfunctory wipe replaces it in baby's mouth. It is done just as we have written it, many thousand times, and yet the problem of infant mortality is represented as a vexatious mystery. The newspapers solicit charitable aid, and write eloquent appeals regarding the necessity of sending a few babies to the seashore in the summer time or to supply a few with ice during the hot spells. A hundred other energetic enthusiasts send forth their laudable effort to raise the standard of child hygiene, yet the manufacturers of the comforter, and the ignorant mother and nurse who use it, do more harm in one day than all the honest effort of these combined forces can neutralize in a year.
The rubber comforter is one of the most fertile causes of infection and illness in babies because of the peculiar adaptability to collecting germs which it possesses.
When the comforter is finally discarded the habit of sucking is so firmly established that the child will suck its thumb for many years after. This results in further disease and deformity to the growing mouth and throat, and also to the thumb.
After a child has used a pacifier or comforter for some time it invariably becomes a mouth breather. A mouth-breathing child is very apt to catch cold and as a consequence of the habit may become catarrhal or tubercular.
What Can be Done to Lessen the Evil Effects of the "Comforter" Habit?—It is a most difficult habit to cure when once established. The very least that can be done is to keep the comforter scrupulously clean, washing it several times daily. To have not one, but two or three, kept in a saturated solution of boracic acid, ready to put into the baby's mouth should one be required to replace another that has fallen out. We should furnish a large shield to prevent it being swallowed. We can try the method of weaning the baby from the comforter by tying a ribbon to it and to the child's bodice. The system is gradually to shorten the ribbon until it becomes too short for the baby to suck in comfort. It will then gradually grow away from the habit.