Second Teething, 1938 - Susan Isaacs explains something of the fears and wobbles that can be connected with this stage of life.

May 1938, in Home and School "Readers’ Questions" 

More on Second teething 

“F.W.” writes: Your replies are always very helpful. You mentioned once that the second teething was a difficult time for children. Could you explain this?

There are two reasons for why the second teething tends to upset children. The first is that the child feels that parts of his body which have hitherto seemed frim and solid and permanent parts of himself now become loose and move about, and either fall out or have to be pulled out. He does not know and cannot know that this is a perfectly ordinary proceeding, which every child goes through.

Very often he fears that things won’t end here. If his teeth can come loose and come out, what about his finger nails and his fingers, and arms and all parts of his body? Sometimes the child is quite aware that he fears that he may come to pieces altogether, sometimes he just had a vague dread, which those of us who are specially studying children have come to know means an unconscious fear that his body will fall to pieces.

A Scotch friend of mine told me not long ago how he remembered one boy at his school who lost one of his front teeth, and walked about amongst the other children with the most gloomy face, looking very unhappy and saying so mournfully, “Oh, I’ll dee, I’ll dee!”

Sometimes children’s dreams at this age show how much they are occupied with the idea of everything coming loose and falling down. They may dream, for example, of wonderful castles of ivory, suddenly toppling over and falling to pieces. Sometimes they dream or imagine that the end of the world is coming.

Other children develop special tics and habit spasms at this age, for example, stretching arms out which seem to show that they are still there to stretch.

Of course they get over their puzzlement and anxiety presently, and come to believe that we life goes on all the same, and their body remains whole and secure. But this reassurance does not come all at once.

The second reason is that the child feels the whole process of teething to be mysterious, strange and incontrollable. This applies to the growth and of the new teeth as well as to the falling out of the old.

It is something he cannot control or stop or alter. He cannot wish it to happen or prevent it happening. It just happens. And this is frightening to the child because it reminds him of uncontrollable feelings – of those old deep feelings of greed and anger and naughty impulses which he has with such trouble learnt to control and keep in order.

From infancy all through the early years, children have to struggle very hard to master their tears, tempers, their wetting and dirtying, their jealousy and anger, and fears of loneliness and greed, wanting to be first, destructiveness, and all the other feelings, which have to be kept in order if one is to be friendly with other people and happy in the world.

And now, when he has learnt to control his tempers and his wishes, here comes along something he cannot control, no matter how much he tries. How does he know what may happen tomorrow then? He may lose control altogether and do all the naughty destructive things that he wanted to do as a tiny infant, and thus lose control of himself in every other way.

But it often takes the child a year or more to understand all this and, and to get over the feelings of bewilderment and doubt about himself which were stirred up.

Sometimes a little friendly talk about his fears will help him. It is a help to a child to feel that grown-ups know what his feelings are, and have perhaps felt the same puzzlement themselves. But even with this help it takes time, as it is all really a matter of feeling rather knowledge.

When the child’s doubts and fears express themselves in queer little habits and hesitations, it is best not to bother much about these, and try not to stop them forcibly, or to nag or scold him about them; it is better to work indirectly and make sure that he has plenty of fun and play and companionship, and the chance to learn games and sports and handicrafts and all the skills and interests which give him confidence and belief in himself, and help to forget about his doubts.