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9/07/2012

Bye Bye Mr. Binky


I was one of those new moms that swore I would take away my child’s beloved binky once he turned one. I figured it’d be easy to just take the binky with the bottle and call it good. Until I realized just how beloved that binky was… and how not so lovely my child became when he didn’t have it.
The truth is, that binky became my crutch, my little hope for sanity. Whether it was at the crowded grocery store, the park, or even in the comfort of my home, whenever Keegan started to throw a tantrum or cry inconsolably, I turned to the trusted binky. It would calm him instantly and for me that was a relief. So his first birthday obviously came and went. We tried a time or two to take it away, but gave in way too soon.
 After a few months we started to only give it to him at during naps and at bedtime with hopes that we’d shortly end that too. Yea… just one sleepless night and you could forget that. I think we made it a whole hour before getting up to find the binkies we had hid.
So here we are, coming up on K’s second birthday and he still uses a binky… or he did, until two nights ago. That’s right, I said DID. I noticed bumps around K’s lips from him sucking the pacifier too hard and decided that was it. They had to go. We threw them all away and gave up cold turkey.  I admit, when he woke up at 2AM screaming for his binky, I so wished I hadn’t thrown them away.
The first night, K woke up twice. Once at two, when he was screaming bloody murder and then again at 4am. When he woke up at 4 he started to scream for his binky, and once he realized he wasn’t going to get it, he began begging for cheese. Who wants chees at 4am? Only my child.  I obviously got up to get the cheese, because I knew I wouldn’t get any sleep otherwise. After I gave K the cheese he decided he wanted to eat it in the living room on the couch and watch cartoons… at 4 AM!  Did I mention it was a weeknight, meaning Mikael and I had to work the next day? Yea, poor planning on our part.  But K survived the first night. And the second night was even better. He only woke up once and only took a few minutes to calm down before falling back into his sweet little dreams.
Night three is just starting, but he didn’t even ask for his binky when he fell asleep. I’m seeing the progress already. He’ll forget all about them by this time next week. Now I have to decide whether or not I want to start the process all over again and give our new bundle a binky when he comes. Of course, if I do, it will be after we’re done breastfeeding, so at least I’ll have a couple months to decide.
We went cold turkey, but there are lots of different methods for weaning children from binkies or pacifiers. Below are a few articles I found around the web with good tips.
 
 Find what works for you and let me know how it goes.
 
 
 
 
 

3 comments:

  1. My son was so attached to his pacifier that it started to become a real problem. We could not go anywhere without making sure that we had a pacifier in hand. My friend absolutely raved about the bye bye binky method so we decided to give it a try (she found it at www.bye-bye-binky.com ). All I can say is WOW, worked beautifully for my son with no tantrums, not even one! Super easy and four days later he had no interest in his binky. We really were amazed… highly recommended… Amber

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    1. I am going to have to try that with our 2nd. I thought i wouldn't give him a binky, but it's the only way any of get any sleep!

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