Eating hands is an important behavior in the developmental process of babies. However, if the mother does not handle this behavior properly, it can also lead to some trouble! Today, let’s talk about baby hand eating this thing. 1, hand-eating is a normal developmental performance Babies are generally 2 months old when they start to eat their hands, but due to individual differences, some children eat their hands early, some children eat their hands late. Eating hands is a manifestation of the baby’s psychological development, the baby at this age will eat hands to self-soothe, relieve their own nervousness. The baby has just come to the world, for his external everything is still unfamiliar, so in the process of adaptation will produce some nervousness. This is a very healthy state for babies to comfort themselves by eating their hands. Eating hands is also a manifestation of baby’s sensory development and cognitive development. Baby has mastered the action of putting his hand in his mouth accurately and started to explore external things with his mouth, and the first one to explore is his own hand. At this time the baby does not have self-awareness, do not know that the hand is part of their own body, so they will use their mouth to explore their hands. In the process of baby’s sensory development, cognitive development, in addition to eating hands, babies will gradually explore other things, such as holding their feet to chew, licking their own sleeves or collar, etc.. With the development of grasping ability, the baby will grab toys and other things that can be grasped into the mouth, this is the baby’s way to explore the outside world at this age. As babies grow up, they will sit, crawl, grab things to play with, and master more interesting activities than stuffing things into their mouths, the behavior of exploring the outside world with their mouths will slowly disappear. In addition, when babies are teething, there will be discomfort, and babies will relieve this discomfort by eating their hands or biting other things. 2.What should we pay attention to when babies eat their hands? Baby’s hand-eating behavior at a normal age belongs to the natural development process, we can’t stop it, we have to calmly accompany the baby to experience it. We should pay attention to the baby’s hand hygiene, wash the baby’s hands clean and let him eat freely. If the baby starts to eat sleeves and chew toys, we have to ensure the hygiene of the things the baby is holding and eating to prevent diseases from entering through the mouth. Disinfect the toys regularly, then put them next to your baby and let him explore them freely. Attention! Winter to the baby wear too many clothes, the baby wants to eat hands, but because of too much clothing and can not put their hands in the mouth, this will affect the natural development of the baby Oh! 3, stop baby eating hands, what will be the consequences? Eating hands is a healthy development of the baby’s performance, but also in preparation for the baby’s independent feeding. But some parents feel that eating hands is very unhygienic, strictly stop the baby from eating hands. Once the baby eats the hand, the mother will grab the baby’s hand, or even hit the baby’s hand, scaring the baby, just do not allow the baby to put his hand into the mouth. Some of the babies whose hand-eating is stopped are afraid to eat their hands. When he gets to the age where he has to eat by himself, he is also less likely to put food in his mouth, and often needs to be fed to eat; it will be very difficult for him to hold a spoon and eat by himself. His subconscious mind already remembers the experience of being stopped from putting his hand in his mouth, so he naturally refuses to put things in his mouth again. Psychologist Freud’s research analysis says that babies will have a period of oral appetite before the age of 1, and will eat hands or use their mouths to explore everything, which is a normal psychological development process. If we prevent the baby from eating during the oral appetite period, it will allow the baby to have bad development. For example, babies generally end their micturition period around the age of one. As babies grow up, they have better ways of exploring things, such as throwing toys, knocking toys, etc., and won’t often put things in their mouths. However, if parents stop their babies from eating their hands, their oral appetite will not be satisfied naturally and the oral appetite period will be extended naturally. How long it will last depends on how much he is stopped from eating his hands. We often see that some babies in kindergarten are still eating their hands, some teenagers are still biting their nails, and there are even adults who chew their nails when they are nervous. The reason for this phenomenon, one is that his need to explore with his mouth as a child is not fully met, one is that he is very insecure, and there is no other way to deal with tension, so it is only through eating hands, biting fingernails to release tension and stabilize the emotions of the self. 4, baby 3 years old still eat hands, what should I do? A mother came to me for advice, saying that her baby was still eating his hands at the age of 3, and that no amount of control would help, so what should she do? According to our communication, we learned that when the baby a few months old eating hands, the mother did not know that it was right to eat hands at that time, so she used various methods to stop the baby from eating hands. As a result, the baby’s hand-eating period was automatically prolonged and has been prolonged until now. Mom was mean to the baby and hitting the baby’s hand could not stop the baby from eating his hands. Now, every night the baby must eat his hands to sleep, and there is nothing mom can do. The baby does not eat hands in kindergarten, but loves to eat hands in front of the mother. After understanding the analysis, I learned that the mother loves her baby very much and attaches great importance to her baby’s education, but because she is overly concerned about her baby, she tends to control her baby’s behavior, causing her baby to be especially nervous in front of her mother, so she uses hand-eating to comfort herself and relieve her nervousness. When the baby is in kindergarten, he is in a big group, so there is no one to watch him and control his every behavior like his mother, so he is more relaxed and does not eat his hands. After communication, I gave the mother the following suggestions: (1) Do not try to directly stop the baby from eating his hands, but give the baby a sense of security, so that the baby is happy and relaxed. The baby’s sense of security is enough, not easy to nervous, slowly will feel that eating hands is not interesting, the behavior will slowly subside. (2) to divert the baby’s attention, give the baby something fun, so that the baby’s hands have something to do, there is no time to put their hands into the mouth. (3) The mother attaches importance to the baby’s education is very good, but not too much control of all the baby’s behavior, so that the baby overstressed, lack of space for independent exploration. Excessive control is not good for your baby’s healthy personality development. It is important to educate your baby loosely and tightly. Some of your baby’s behaviors should be stopped immediately, but some of them are okay for your baby to try. After all, for children and even adults, making mistakes is also a good learning opportunity. (4) Learn more from good parenting books, for example, Professor Bao Xiulan’s book has clear developmental rules for babies, which can prevent mothers from making obvious mistakes in the process of raising their babies. The best love is to give your child the right kind of love.