10.26.2011

Down with Pacifiers

When Addison and Mackenzie were born, I was fanatical about some things (sleeping, feeding, routine), but relatively laid-back about others.  One thing I was very relaxed about was the use of pacifiers.  I was NOT one of the mothers hoping my babies wouldn't get attached to them; rather, I had the attitude of if it gets me more peace and quiet...let 'em have it!

And boy, did my girls get attached to their pacis.

We didn't use them in the hospital, but I remember on the first night home, after I had dozed for a few minutes, my mom told me that she and Jeremy had opened a package of pacifiers, sterilized them, and given them to the girls.  At that moment in time, it was a blessing.  I remember how HUGE those first pacis looked against the girls' tiny faces.

addie

Their little heads slowly caught up in size, and the attachment to the pacifiers grew stronger.  We were so proud when A & M learned to maneuver their pacis back in their mouths by themselves.  Reaching into the backseat to retrieve a lost pacifier a dozen times a day got really old.  And, oh, when they learned to find the pacis in their bed at night...life got so much easier!

nap

But now, two and a half years later, I am ready to kiss the pacis goodbye.  They have served their purpose, and I am now over it.  We have tried multiple times to cut the pacifiers except for bedtime, but we have not been very successful so far.  The girls have not had them at all at school this year, including for naps, and I thought that would help us at home, but it really hasn't.  My mom reports that on some days, the first thing the girls do when she picks them up from school is request a paci.  And of course, they each only want a certain paci, in a certain shape, size, and color...so we have to keep up with the same two pacis all the time.  Ridiculousness!

I will admit that I have been willing to take the easy route and just hand over the paci when they get whiny and start demanding it....but I have just about reached my limit.  I am sick of pictures like this:

Rainy day activities

I want to see my girls' faces without a paci in the way! 

Ugh, how I dread fighting the fight though.  The whining and begging may very well drive me insane.  It's got to happen sometime, and I have a feeling it wouldn't be much easier in six months.  The potty training has stalled for the time being (thanks for the great comments on that post, by the way...it helps to know we are not alone!), so maybe now is the time to go ahead and focus on ditching the pacis?

We have thrown around a few cute ideas/rewards for giving them up, the most appealing of which is taking a trip to the zoo, then leaving all our pacis for the baby animals who "need" them.  I just don't know...it's going to be rough any way we go about it, I have a feeling.  I can feel myself getting more and more ready mentally, and that's at least half the fight, I think.

Any ideas for me??  If you've fought the paci fight, how did you do it?  Anyone want to take my kids for about two weeks and bring them home paci-free??

12 comments:

  1. How's this? I'll do the pacis and in return, send mine to you to do the potty training :)

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  2. Beth just wrote about this!

    http://bethwillrodandthequads.blogspot.com/2011/10/binky-fairy.html

    Her kiddos are a bit older (just turned three), but I've heard of several families using this idea.

    Good luck! :)

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  3. Oh man, Ada LOVED her paci. We told her for a long time that on her third birthday she would be a big girl and wouldn't need a paci anymore. (Like for months told her). On the eve of her birthday, she left her paci on the coffee table, and she knew that in the morning a gift would be waiting for her in it's place. That first night was AWFUL. She cried and cried, and I cried (without her knowing it). Seriously, it broke my heart because she was genuinely so sad. But, I slept with her that night, and she finally fell asleep (it took a long time), and that was pretty much the worst of it. Seriously. I think it took a few nights for her to stop crying a little bit at bed time, but that one night was the only part that was awful. My biggest advice is to go cold turkey. If not, I just don't think it works. She is now almost 4 1/2, and she still talks about her paci though--that's how much she loved it!! So...you can do it. (I don't have as great an attitude about potty training. That was AWFUL)

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  4. Potty training has stalled here too! We don't have pacis, but the boys love sucking their thumb (Tommy) or two fingers (Liam). Phoebe was a thumb sucker, and we had no luck breaking her of that habit.

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  5. I've heard some people use a "paci fairy," in the same style as the tooth fairy. The idea is that she takes all of the pacifers to babies who need them, and leaves a present for the "big kids" in return. I don't know if that would work for your kids, but, hey, it might!

    Thanks for your comment on my post :)

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  6. My girls didn't take paci's, but my mom would always put off taking paci's away from my twin sis and I because we were so addicted to them! But one day, she finally just told us that they were all gone and we never asked again! How lucky was she?! LOL

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  7. omg. wish i had advice. we just got rid of ours and said we didn't have them. the kids just seemed to be okay with it. we never got them out again! :)

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  8. The Crazies ever only got them at sleep times, but I'll tell you what we did. We seriously prepared them for a visit that we were having with their pregnant aunt. We explained that the baby would need them because babies need binks and big kids didn't and we really got them on board. We also explained that once you gave your binks to a baby, you got a reward from the Binky Fairy...that got them too. I took them away one night when Husband was a the gym. They cried for a while, but I kept explaining that they were going to Baby Landon. They finally went to sleep. We had a few days of asking where they were and I'd say, "where did we send them? Who needs them more than you?" They'd enthusiastically reply, "BABY LANDON!!!"

    Hang in there...it does happen...just don't ever give them back no matter how much you want to. I hear the older they get, the harder it is.

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  9. I'm thinking you could leave them out for Santa when you leave out the cookies. Maybe tell the girls that Santa needs to take them to little baby girls who need them?

    And about potty training - the family advice I have gotten is to just put them in underpants and in a few days, they'll decide it's gross. I don't know how I feel about this, though. But this is what I've been told!

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  10. I have 20 month old twin girls. They are addicted to the paci. I have been slowly cutting tiny holes in the nipples. They hate it when air goes through it. I have also been only letting them have them when they are laying down. I am tired of paci pics too!!!

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  11. My son was just over 3 when we bit the bullet and took the paci away. We made a huge deal over taking him to Build-a-Bear (the only time he'd ever been) and sewing up the paci into a puppy. He could still feel the paci inside the leg of the dog, and it seemed to be comforting.

    Good luck!

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  12. I'm right there with you. I tried earlier to wean my 2 yr old, but she then began sucking her fingers and chewing on her fingers when her molars came in, resulting in what I've named "teething induced bulimia". Our pediatrician told us to give her a paci because when we adopted our daughter she was born addicted to cocaine, heroin, and methadone & she needed to learn to appropriately self-soothe. Having successfully weaned her off the methadone by the time she was 5 wks old I'll say this--Getting your kid off crank is easier than getting them off the paci. No lie. (And as a complete sidebar--my daughter is totally fine. No delays or issues from her birthmom's drug usage. In fact, she's a little too advanced.)

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