So I read somewhere the best age to take the paci away is 18 months. Well that age came and went for Brooklyn. I felt like she was still such a baby at the time and all the ideas you hear on how to take one away would be way over her head. So then I said 2 we would take it away, however we did start making her leave it in her crib. Although I always had one with me just in case. So her second birthday came and we were attending family camp for a week and you share cabins with another family and the last thing I wanted was a difficult time at night. Then we had decided to drive to Houston for Thanksgiving and I thought no way would I want to do a two day road trip with out the paci. Then I was so sick with morning sickness I totally caved and let her have it whenever, wherever. So as you can see something always came up and I would push it off. So with our birthday month coming up, possibly moving, and new baby's arrival approaching I knew I needed to get on Operation Paci Removal. So January 17th was the day! I got these two things at the library. We read the book and then watched Elmo. She LOVED Elmo! It had a little song that was very catching, "Bye Bye Paci, Paci Bye Bye."
Afterwards she painted a box to gather up all her pacifiers in.
She thought this part was quite fun, too bad she didn't know what was coming.
So at nap that day I laid her down and she asked for it and I sang the song and said remember paci went bye bye for the baby. And she was fine about it. Really couldn't be that easy? However I stupidly decided to do this on a day where I always have to wake her early at 2 in order to get Bella to dance. So in other words I need her to fall asleep quickly. Today she did not. In fact she never fell asleep. :( She did however fall asleep on the way to dance briefly. So she was a complete crab and mess that evening due to lack of sleep but never asked for paci. That night I read a lot of books and sang and rocked her a long time. Then I laid her down and she was more than ready and went to sleep. The next day she asked for her paci a couple of times but was ok when I said it was bye bye. I couldn't believe it. So nap time again and she went down fine but it literally look her 2 hrs to fall asleep, she just played in her bed forever but finally fell asleep.
Fast forward to today and nap and bedtime are getting easier. She falls asleep much quicker but it is not easy like it once was. Before I could just lay her down and walk away but now we have a LONG story, singing, and rocking session and then I lay her down. And depending on her tiredness level she'll still fuss a little about going down. But thankfully she does and sleeps fine once she does fall asleep. She does good when she sees other babies with pacifiers but the other day she came across her paci box and got one in her mouth. She was not a happy camper when I took it away. :( Thankfully she was quickly over it. So thankful its behind us and that she's doing ok with it. I definitely realized it was more of a crutch for me than it was for her. Man was it hard letting go. :)
So proud of our little bean!
2 comments:
My son held on to his binky like it was a lifeline! We actually started out by only giving it to him during naps and when he was real fussy, but as time went on, he seemed to want it more (it went from a suckle need, to a want). My mom found the bye bye pacifier method (www.bye-bye-pacifier.com), printed it and suggested that we go with it. At first I was a bit mad at my mom, but I soon got over it. The method worked amazingly well. My son stopped sucking on it after 4 days! He proceeded to carry it around for another week, but never put it in his mouth. He then got tired of carrying it and simply lost interest. Mom was right, it worked, highly recommended!
i have something your son can put in his mouth and suck, my boy sucked it better than my daughter
Post a Comment