It’s not an easy thing to get rid of the pacifier, but it can be done!
My husband and I thought we would never be able to get our children to give up the pacifier but we did it! Did we lose some sleep in the process absolutely! But we came out on the other end of it with the pacifier gone. How did we do it??
When my daughter was about a year old we stopped clipping her pacifier to her during the day. We realized that she didn’t need it for soothing any more and was using it as a teething toy. We always had it clipped to her clothes so she could always pop it into her mouth, so it was readily accessible to her. But once we realized what she was doing with it, we decided it’s time to get rid of it and decided no more clipping it to her clothes. The first few times she cried and fussed because it wasn’t there but she quickly adapted to it not being there.
The second step we took in getting rid of the pacifier was to only give it to her for bed time. Which meant no more pacifier at nap time. This was not easy because it helped her fall asleep and as a stay at home mom I value nap time because it’s my time. So her routine was thrown out of wack a little bit. We gave her a small little stuffed elephant to sleep with for comfort for nap time and after about 2 weeks she was use to naps with no pacifier!
Some of you must be thinking why give her a toy that might cause her to not breathe if her face ends up against it? That’s a valid question. We knew she was ok to sleep with the stuffed elephant because she was rolling around so much. We knew that she would roll away from it if she ever got stuck but also sometimes she didn’t cuddle with the elephant she just needed to see it while laying down, so we put it in the corner of her crib within her line of sight.
Once we knew she didn’t need the pacifier for nap time, we took a huge leap of faith and threw out all but one pacifier. Why keep one pacifier around, for those days when you think you can’t take the crying anymore and you cave! But my husband and I were on the same team and were committed to getting rid of the pacifier! It helps when you and your spouse/significant other are on the same team when it comes to parenting.
The last step we took in getting rid of the pacifier was not allowing it at bed time! Now, once we knew she could get through nap time without the pacifier we extended it to bed time. The first couple of days were rough! She would wake up crying, screaming but we stuck to it. We gave her, her stuffed elephant and calmed her down. And within a few more weeks she had given up the pacifier!
Now throughout this time, we kept everything else the same for nap and bedtime routine. With nap time she would have lunch, milk and a story and I’d sit with her for a few minutes rubbing her back and would do that every time she woke up until she was use to not having the pacifier. With bedtime it was dinner, bath, book and song and dad or I would sit with her and rub her back till she was comfortable. Keeping her routine consistent helped out tremendously!
We’re no experts but we were able to get both our kids off the pacifier by age 15 months. My son gave it up a little quicker than my daughter and my husband thought that our son was never going to give it up! With each of our children we started at the 12 month mark and went through each phase for at least a month to make sure they were completely comfortable without the pacifier before moving on to the next step of getting rid of the pacifier.
I hope that if you try this process, it works for you like it worked for us! Comment below on how you were able to get your kids to give up the pacifier.