Bye Bye Pacifier

Jill - posted on 09/28/2009

From now until Christmas explain that as she is now 4 she will have to leave it out with the cookies and milk for Santa to take away to the babies. We did this with Max and we made a ceremony of gathering them up and putting them on the plate. We kept one in the cupboard secretly just in case but he never asked for one again. Indeed when we visited Santa the next year he said" You took my pacifiers for the babies last year". I nodded above his head and Santa said - yes the babies really liked your ones.

Erica - posted on 09/27/2009

First I would like to say to Brittany....I got you beat....I'm 26 and YES world I still suck my thumb. (only when I am sleep). But on a more helpful note, with my son, and this is the God honest truth, I just lost it one day in Wal-Mart and I refused to buy another one because he only sucked a specific kind and they had stop selling those kind. So I went home and tried my best to find something else to give him when he sleeps. I gave him a bear and that was all she wrote. The best thing I can say do is to give it to her only once a day for a certain time of day, then lessen the time and eventually get it down to like 30 mins once a week, etc. It does work, but it is different for every child. My baby sister is 5 (yes I have a 5 year old sister) and she just stop sucking her paci by using this method. I hope I was of some help.

Lynnell - posted on 09/27/2009

Hi

It can be a hard habit to break. Though when my daughter was 2 and half we warned her for a week that when the garbage man came the dummies were going. That morning we collected all the dummies well most I hid two just in case. We then put them in the bin took the bin out and when the garbage man came we wave goodbye. I think she asked for them once so it was pretty easy.



A friend of mine just cut all the nipples off her childs dummies so she only had the hard bit of the dummy and eventually they just through them out. So it really depends on your child.



I also had another who left them out for santa and he left something else.

Elizabeth - posted on 09/27/2009

I had the same problem with my son I let him throw them away when he was ready at 3. We would always tell him them he was a big boy and he should give them away to other baby's but it didn't work, until my siter-in-law had a baby and we told him he should give them to her so she would cry. When he saw the baby with a pacifier he finally gave them all to her. We threw them out though.

Jen - posted on 09/27/2009

Pretend to give it to a new born baby, saying, She is a big girl now and this newly born baby needs it, By being a big girl's responsibility is to give support to a new baby. Maybe that will help

Susan - posted on 09/27/2009

I worked in my son's day care for a yr and I would collect the pacifiers at nap time when they children were alseep and tuck them in their cubby's. some would ask where they were when they woke up and it has been a joke at my house if you can't find something the answer is "I sold it to the gypsies". the kids got a kick out of that...and several moms asked if I would help break their children of the habit...so after a week of telling them i sold them to the gypsies, I dressed as a gypsie lady and had a basket when they walked in in the AM...I told them they were big boys andgirls and I was the gypsie lady who collected pacifiers for new babies and would they be willing to try to give theirs up? most would walk in and immediately hand over the pacifier. So maybe something silly and fun like that might help. As they hit the 4 yr old room, I had one girl who would try to talk with it in her mouth, and I just told her she was a big girl and if she wanted to talk to me she had to take that silly thing out of her mouth. That worked with her as well. It is a hard thing for sure....I am sooooo glad my son never wanted one.

Brittany - posted on 09/26/2009

Im going to tell you the flat out honest truth right now. Very few people know this about me but now everyone will lol. I am 20 years old and i still suck my thumb. Its a sense of comfort, take the pacifier away once shes asleep and try to wean her off it. She will probably start sucking her thumb (thats what i did) and my parents always tried to stop it, but the more they tried the worse it got. They even tried putting thisdisgusting tasting stuff on my thumb so try and get me to not want to suck it. But i just got used to the taste. I dont know if this will help at all but I can atleast let you know from my personal experience what it is like for the kid. Hope this helps!