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Pacifiers Are Out: Breaking the Binkie Habit

by Momversation on November 01, 2009 — Comments (2)

Parents of toddlers have probably tried pretty much everything under the sun in an effort to put distance between toddlers and their pacifiers (a.k.a. soothers). I tend to prefer the more honest and direct methods (not deceiving the child by pretending that the soother has been sent to the North Pole), but I understand that desperate times call for desperate measures. And it may not take very long for a parent who has healthcare professionals constantly reminding him or her about the dental and speech-and-language fallout of extended pacifier use to start feeling pretty desperate indeed.

Here are the basic options that parents tend to turn to when they're trying to decide how to get rid of the pacifier (ranging from gently to cold turkey).

Limiting soother access to naptime and bedtime and when the toddler is really upset (as opposed to letting the toddler have unlimited access to the soother 24/7) in an effort to gradually wean the toddler off the soother. This can take a while (and it may lead to protests on the part of your toddler), but it's an up-front method of dealing with the issue.

Letting the toddler know that it's not healthy for her teeth for her to keep using the soother; and that it is almost time to get rid of the soother.

Read more about pacifiers from expert Ann Douglas on Parents Ask.

Keywords

Parenting

2 Comments

Sarah@Ohana Mama

I told my son that when he turned three he had to say aloha to his paci. I did this for a good 6 months. I kept gently reminding him.

A day shy of his third birthday, I was putting him down for a nap and said "You know, tomorrow is your birthday and you'll be a big 3 so it's time to send your pacifier to the other babies in the world for them to use."

He sat straight up and said, "let's do it now!"

I didn't hesitate. We got up, wrote on an envelope, "To the babies of the world" Plopped his two remaining pacis in it and HE placed it in our mail box.

He went to sleep without it (WOW! I was in shock!) And I called my husband to tell him that the pacifiers were in the mail box. He drove over from work and grabbed the envelope.

When Cam woke up the envelope and his pacifiers were gone.

He was excited.

We had a rough two nights I'd say (it was hard, I won't lie - a child crying desperately for their paci WILL break your heart and almost send you running to the store to grab whatever pacifier you can find at 2 a.m.) but I stood strong, Cameron stood strong and he never had one again.

*we waited until 3 because he wasn't ready at 1 or 2 or 2.5 and then I had his little sister so I didn't want too much change around when she was born. So three it was)

With my daughter..well, no pacifier has ever touched her lips...although she is a thumb sucker...and I know I can't send her thumb to the babies of the world...shit, what am I going to do?!

Mon, 2009-11-02 15:11

Kait

We did the weaning thing for a while and it worked very well for our oldest daughter. For our youngest, the weaning simply wasn't working. We had a bowl in their room where the binkies were kept so one night before bed, I cut the rubber part off all of them. When my daughter was getting ready for bed, I told her to pick out a binkie. She selected one, tried to put it in her mouth, and it fell out. She threw it in the trash and came to look for another one. She went through the whole bowl, told us "All too small!" and went to bed without one. We had to remind her for about a week about what happened to her binkies but overall, it was the easiest way to get her to give them up.

Mon, 2009-11-02 08:27