Bye Bye Binky

Getting rid of the pacifier has been a work-in-progress since Caleb was 15 months old! At Caleb's 15-month appointment, the pediatrician told me straight up that it's time to be all done pacifier when she saw Caleb had it in his mouth (which I normally didn't bring out with me in public but knew he was getting shots and would need something to comfort him). She said cold turkey was the best method and to just throw it away.

Matt and I didn't act on her advice right away because sleeping has been our biggest trial with Caleb. The first time Caleb slept through the night was when he was 3 1/2 months old, and that was a fluke. I recorded in Caleb's journal any time he slept through the night because the nights were so infrequent!!! (When Caleb was 5 months, I have an entry expressing my frustration of waking up with him twice during the middle of the night every night!) It was more than just sleeping through the night that was so difficult. Getting him to go to sleep by himself took forever/5months (I did start some bad habits in his first few months of nursing him to sleep which didn't help matters...I didn't start reading books on sleeping until he was 3 months and realized everything I had been doing was wrong!). I remember how I used to dread putting Caleb down for a nap or down for bed because it was so hard! There was always lots of crying/screaming involved not just for a few minutes, but for 45 min. to an hour. When he became attached to his pacifier, there were no complaints on our end simply because it made nap/bedtime so much easier.

So at 16 months we took away the pacifier cold turkey. He actually did okay as long as we were in the room with him (usually holding his hand) until he fell asleep. However, a week later, he caught some sort of cold virus and was the sickest he'd ever been with fevers, stuffy nose, etc. We finally gave in and gave him back his pacifier so that he would actually sleep. After he was better, we noticed most every kid older than Caleb at church still had a pacifier, so we didn't worry about taking it away anymore, but made sure he only had it for naps and for bed.

About a month ago, we decided that he better be all done pacifier by the time he turned 2. So we tried cold turkey again. I guess he was ultra-attached by this point and after listening to my toddler cry for 90 minutes, my nerves just couldn't take that twice a day (nap and bedtime). Instead we tried snipping his binky, and that's what ended up working for us. I snipped it just a little at first, and then once a week I would snip it a little more. It got to the point where he didn't like his pacifier anymore, which is what we needed.

The glitch in this plan happened when we made our impromptu trip to Utah. Caleb wouldn't sleep and was preventing his cousin, Dallin, from sleeping as well. As if a road trip is not hard enough, throw 2 crying, cranky babies on top of that where the parents never get a reprieve from trying to entertain their children, and it will drive anyone crazy! After 2 days of driving to Utah and wanting to pull my hair out (as well as knowing everyone else is miserable), we finally gave in and gave Caleb his cousin's spare binky for the rest of the vacation. It made things 10 times easier with getting Caleb to take naps and sleep in an unfamiliar environment, and the drive home was much more pleasant when the babies actually took a 2 hour nap and slept well at night.

I was worried about starting from scratch again when we got home, but Caleb only had a tough time that first night going to sleep. Now sometimes he'll still cry for 10 minutes or so, but generally he will just lay down until he goes to sleep.

Mission accomplished!

As a weird side note, Caleb has called his pacifier a 'na na' since he was about 18 months old. I have no clue why he calls it this. Dallin, Caleb's cousin who is 6 months younger than him, has started calling his pacifier a 'na na' as well, much to his parent's dismay :o).