Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Mommy Tip Tuesday

Instead of giving a mommy tip, I'm asking for tips. We have been trying to get Nicole off of the pacifier, but the more Dan uses the pacifier, the more Nicole wants to. Whenever Dan has the pacifier in his mouth, Nicole wants one for her mouth. We are constantly taking it away from her, but she has a stash of them somewhere and keeps putting it in her mouth.

I considered saying "goodbye" to the pacifier and throwing them away, but we really wanted to reuse them for Dan since we already have them and they are easily washable. But, she just can't give it up. She cries and throws fits when we take them away, she will steal pacifiers right out of Dan's mouth, and she can't (or refuses to) sleep without it.

We try telling her they are just for bed time, but then she says she wants to go to bed all the time and will lay in her bed with the pacifier rather than come out and play and leave the pacifier behind. We almost had her off the pacifier until we had Dan and then everything changed.

So, what are your tips for getting off the pacifier?

5 comments:

Adrianne Miller said...

Find all of the binkys and cut off the tips. Tell her they are broken. It worked wonders for us. It was easy to get him off of it during the day and we'd only give him one at naps and nighttime. It was a little harder to get him to sleep without one when we cut the tip off of all of them, but now he is binky free!

Jasmine said...

From what I've heard, you're supposed to replace pacifiers like toothbrushes - every three months. I don't really do this, because my kids only use them or bedtime and special circumstances after 7 or 8 months, so I don't feel like it's worth it or necessary to replace them. However, I woul strongly recommend getting a whole new set for Daniel for two reasons -- 1)If Nicole has alreay been using them, the chance of them breaking or malfunctioning is higher, creating a higher choking hazard. 2)It seems like Nicole is really attached to "her" pacifiers. Saying Goodbye to the old ones and getting a whole new batch of boy pacifiers for Daniel might be te mental switch she needs.

I'm a huge advocate of getting rid of the pacifier entirely before the child turns two, before an emotional attachment to the thing has been made. It makes it a lot easier to just take it away, without a big show or story to go with why it's suddenly gone. I took Alexis' away when she was 16 months old, because she was showing signs that she really didn't need it anymore.

My advice would be to just get rid of them, have her help you throw them away, and have her help you give new ones to Daniel, so that she knows they are his and not for her to use. I know his means buying more, but I think it will be worth it.

Marie said...

Spankings. Lots and lots of spankings.

Jill & Jake said...

The "Binkie Fairy" came to our house and took the binkies away to give to a new baby who needed them more than they did. The "Binkie Fairy" then left a train(Jacob) or a tea set (Amara) or a toy truck (Ethan) or a dolly (Keira). They were so excited about their new toy and they felt so "big" about doing something special for a baby they hardly missed it until that night. They still had their blankets so they were okay. Tell her they're going to Sarah's new baby. That would mean something to her.
We really talked up the binkie fairy for about a week and then she came for her "visit". Good Luck!!!

Angela said...

Definitely get rid of hers and get new ones. Like Jasmine said the chance of old ones breaking is high and she's attached to hers.

My kids never would take them, despite us trying really hard to get them to. But with her age I'd try to convince her to trade them in for something better. My kids go for that type of thing.

I had similar troubles getting my oldest off the bottle when #2 came along when she was 11 months old and he ended up having to be bottle fed. Kind of hard to tell her no and then make her watch the baby have one.