Why Do You Think Babies Like Pacifiers?

I read posts on parenting bulletin boards on various websites, especially ones dealing with breastfeeding. It's nice to read about other moms having similar experiences to mine, and every once in a while, I offer advice to someone with questions. The most popular question/complaint recently has been the issue of the infant "using me like a pacifier." Many of these moms aren't really upset with their infant nursing so often, but they are being pressured by people in their lives to only allow access to their breasts when the baby is definitely hungry. It's just another example of people's ignorance of the actual processes involved in nursing a baby and the expectations the baby has of it's mother. We have evolved to this point over millions of years; I hardly think that a misinformed grandmother is going to convince an infant that it needs to adapt to the modern world in the space of a few months.

Kathy Dettwyler is a well respected anthropologist who has studied parenting and breastfeeding in many cultures around the world. She has written many books and maintains a great website with lots of information about natural human breastfeeding (http://www.kathydettwyler.org/dettwyler.html) Here's a little of what she has to say about the frequency of nursing in humans:

"Continuous contact species have milk that is low in protein and fat and high in carbohydrates. The offspring tend to nurse very often, but not take much at any one nursing. The low protein and fat content of the milk make it quick and easy to digest, and the baby is quickly hungry again, but mom is right there, so it just nurses again."

"From the composition of human milk, it is clear that human babies are designed to nurse several times an hour, around the clock."

Putting an infant on a 3-4 hour nursing schedule is counter to our biology. It can lead to underweight babies, low milk supply, and a quick return of the mother's fertility. Perhaps many of the times a new mom thinks she's being "used as a pacifier" she is in fact nursing her baby exactly as often as the baby expects/needs to be nursed.

Babies observed in natural societies do not suck their thumbs (read about it on Dettwyler's website). They have unrestricted access to their mother's breasts, so they don't need to satisfy their sucking instinct on anything else. In our increasingly unnatural society, moms don't spend their time in constant contact with their babies. They have other things to do that don't involve caring for their children. Some babies don't fill in and suck their own thumbs, thus freeing their mothers up. Over the years, people have come up with lots of ways to get the baby interested in sucking on something else. I looked up pacifiers on wikipedia(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacifier) and found that they have been met with resistance from the beginning, but not from the perspective of natural breastfeeding:

"in 1909 someone calling herself "Auntie Pacifier" wrote to the New York Times to warn of the "menace to health" (she meant dental health) of "the persistent, and, among poorer classes, the universal sucking of a rubber nipple sold as a 'pacifier'."[4] In England too, dummies were seen as something the "poorer classes" would use, and associated with poor hygiene. In 1914 a London doctor complained about "the dummy teat"

In response to a new mother who is worried that she is being used to replace a rubber or silicone nipple attached to a plastic shield, I would point out the obvious. That plastic pacifier is actually being used to replace YOU. Your baby wants to suck that often because she is supposed to. You are not spoiling her by letting her nurse as often as she needs; you are meeting her needs. She will not need to nurse that often forever. Weaning is actually a process that occurs over years, and will begin when she starts taking some of her nutrition from solid food. Nursing isn't all about food, though. It gives the baby antibodies and comfort (did you know it lowers the baby's blood pressure and heart rate?). Will your baby be doomed if you use a pacifier? No, but there are always trade offs when you tamper with nature. They're not all bad, but I find that many modern mommies won't even acknowledge that they exist.

In the spirit of full disclosure: I gave my two youngest pacifiers in the car. I weighed the unnaturalness of riding in a car seat without the warmth of their mother against the comfort a silicone nipple could give. Both refused them after about five months. If I wasn't driving, I sat in back and figured out how to nurse in the carseat without having to unbuckle myself either ;)