Pacifier Goodbye

We never wanted pacifiers.  We hoped our children would soothe themselves to sleep without a need for anything other than the quiet sound of a dark room.  Only we didn't get what we wanted.  

First off, my son did this thing called, "crying".  He did it loudly and it distressed us.   We thought it would be so nice for  him not to be crying and it turned out that a pacifier would do just that very thing.  So he developed a preference for pacifiers.

My daughter didn't cry as much.  Or wait, that may not be true.  She may have cried more, but we were somewhat hardened to the little wails of infants by then and we could ignore it for longer.   But she had another thing going on--her thumb.

She loved her thumb.  It wasn't bigger than a bean, but she could get it right into her mouth and make the loudest slurping sounds you can imagine, and that had to stop.  For we knew in later years it would be easier to remove a pacifier than a thumb.   So we insisted she develop a dependency to a pacifier.  

Once the little tykes like the pacifiers, they're a mess of trouble to get rid of.   We started long ago by removing them from any situation other than one in which the child might sleep.   Later on, we pulled them from the car seats and not too long ago they were not available for naps.    But at bedtime, they still got to have their pacifiers.

My son I wasn't so worried about.  I had discovered a while back that when he broke through the rubber on a pacifier, he could manage without it.  We were on the last two and I told him that was all there would ever be.   But he's been making those last ones last.

My daughter has a real dependency because we made her have one.  She is not happy at night without a pacifier, and I knew it wasn't going to be a fun transition, even though she could sleep easily in the car or other non-bed location without it fine.

Within the last two weeks things have changed.  My son "lost" his pacifier (which I think meant he put it somewhere so we couldn't find it and then he forgot where that was).   "Oh dear, that's too bad.  When you find it let us know."  He hasn't seemed to mind that it's not longer around overly much.

Then two days ago I noticed my daughter's pacifier had ruptured.  The silicone had finally given in to her sucking and it was no longer functioning as designed.   Ah, that's why she'd been annoyed by it for the last several nights and hadn't wanted it in her mouth.   So we left it as is and she can have it any time she wants it.  Guess what?  She doesn't want it.

So I think we're done with pacifiers.  Next stop, nighttime underpants.  Then, we'll be 100% diaper and pacifier free.

The Big Boy Update and Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Neither my son nor my daughter are using pacifiers at bedtime any more.  This is due to a failure in the pacifier to continue to suck and a completely intentional oversight by us in noticing the fact.