Pacifiers really do help when your baby is crying, but are they doing more harm than good? To be completely honest, they come with some pretty damaging side effects and can really do a lot of damage to your baby’s mouth.

Below I am going to go over some of the most common negative side effects or things associated with pacifier sucking. They are not all they are cracked up to be. Once you have read these risks and so forth I guess it is ultimately up to you whether or not you allow your child to have one. You should at the very least limit the amount of time your child is able to have it and take it away when the time comes instead of allowing them to suck on it well into toddlerhood.

9 Harmful Side Effects of Baby Pacifiers:

1. They create unhealthy attachments.

Being attached to a pacifier is not a good attachment. It was even found that boys who use them more frequently when babies ended up having lower emotional competence than others. They even struggled with making the proper facial expressions you would find in emotional responses. The use of a pacifier really encourages them to look more to it than to the rest of the world for comfort.

2. Extended use can misshape the soft palate.

Pacifiers are terrible for early oral development. Several different bodies of research show that using them beyond the age of 3 can be increasingly harmful. While most people have weaned off of them by then some parents just do not know how to say no. This can cause an ‘open bite’ and many other problems. The soft palate can be affected by a lot of things and so pacifiers are as you would assume one of those things.

3. They can be linked with speech impediments.

Because of the oral issues, I mentioned above speech impediments can also be a big issue. Pacifiers tend to cause the tongue to push forward in-between the teeth. This makes speaking a lot harder as the child becomes more and more accustomed to placing their tongue here.

4. They can cause slanted teeth.

The constant sucking habit that comes with using a pacifier can also cause problems with the upper front teeth. They will not come in properly if the child is using the pacifier long after it should have been taken away. This will cause the teeth to slant outward.

5. They can be serious choking hazards.

If a pacifier breaks or somehow gets pushed down it can become a choking hazard. Many people leave their children alone in their cribs with their pacifiers clearly in their mouths. This should not be a thing, ever.

6. They increase the risk of middle ear infections.

One study actually found children who did not use pacifiers had a 33 percent lower incident of middle ear infections. You really have to pay attention to these things. While the pacifier might be convenient it is not very useful.

7. They can interfere with breastfeeding.

Pacifiers can sometimes cause babies to wean from the breast prematurely. Because they feel they are getting the urge to suck satisfied from the pacifier they don’t want the breast anymore. This can be a big problem for some.

8. The overuse of pacifiers has been linked with cavities.

Did you know that some parents even go so far as to dip their babies pacifiers in honey? Regardless of this pacifiers are quite disgusting. They tend to carry a lot of bacteria that can cause cavities later on. The dental issues surrounding pacifiers are seemingly endless.

9. They become a bad habit quickly.

Children become so attached to these tiny trinkets that they cannot stop sucking on them. They try to carry them on into early childhood and it is quite damning. This is a door to a new kind of bad habit, while it might not sound like much it really does hold a lot of different side effects. Please take the things written above to heart and consider taking away or limiting the use of a pacifier in your household.

For more information on this please feel free to check out the video below. What do you think about this? Will you be allowing your child to use a pacifier?