to just throw all the dummies away

[driedapricots]

dd 2.9 - completely addicted to her dummy. worse recently since birth of ds 3 months ago, but this habit has to be broken now. she's a wingey little madam anyway so should i just chuck them out - do the 0ld dummy fairy thing...and find the strength to deal with the fall out...which will be mammoth. or will this psycologically harm her forever more?! it's all or nothing bcos if i have them in the house i know i'll give in and give her the blasted thing - bit like trying to give up ciggies!
has anyone taken this approach (with a VERY strong willed toddler)??

I just decided to snip DD's dummy perpendicular to the base in all her dummies so there was a hole as she sucked. She was just 2 . She put them in the bin herself and we rewarded with stickers. Didn't do at a specific time , in fact was preparing for Ofsted so was highly strung myself! We had not one bit of bother!
Was fine till MIL babysat and asked at night time where her dummy was, cue bottom lip wobble and a few tears "I'm a big girl so don't have a dummy any more"

All children are different - so there isn't one 'perfect way'. I was going to suggest Santa - but read what happened when you did that !! What a poppet though 'Where do you want to put it in the day' - 'In my mouth ' I can just see her!!

I would go for the Dummy Fairy - 'The Dummy Fairy has run out of dummies for the babies and needs dummies from the Big Girls who don't need them anymore, so tonight we need to leave them all out for her and if there isn't any fuss she will bring you a present' - if she says 'No thanks' then tell her that is fine, she doesn't have to, but you can't buy anymore, so when they are all gone they are all gone. (Then 'lose' them over the next few days till there's none left to have)

She'll get over it quickly enough.

I've never made a fuss, never done the dummy fairy and have never had any problems!
I just remove all dummies, chop them up and bin them so you cant go back and go cold turkey. By day 2 child is fine!

TBH dd might still be getting over the shock of the new baby - could you hold off getting rid for a month or so?

Just a quick word of warning. We did 'dummy fairy' about 3 months ago with DS 3. He misunderstood the concept and was grief stricken for days when he realised that the fairy took them away, rather than deliver lots of new shiny ones.

In the end, the desperate and exhausted mother dummy fairy, bent the rules and left a new one for him on his pillow as a gesture of goodwill towards the misunderstanding, which strangely vanished about a week later as it was stolen by the dummy fox.

This, apparently, was acceptable.

Haha, thanksfor the tip SU

SlightlyUndead - funny little things aren't they!

I agree with LadyLather and had meant to put that in my previous post... it can be a really tough time getting a new sibling, I would put my foot down about it not going out the house, but other than that, leave it for a while - I don't think now is the time to make an issue of it.

LOL at dummyfox

Im a softie, I think it seems a bit cruel to suddenly remove a dummy from a young toddler who doesn't understand why their comfort is gone. I would wait until they were over 2.5/3 and had some understanding. I would limit dummies to sleeping.

Friend went cold turkey on dummy with her dd, she used to be wonderful at sleeping shes now a nightmare.

Dont get me wrong though, I dont like seeing children over 12months wandering about with dummy in.

Dummy fairy came here, left a very cute pink piggy, which now my daughter carries EVERYWHERE. But, we're dummy free, and in an odd way, feel like Piggy is part of the family!

We weaned our DD (about three at the time) off gradually, first only letting her have the dummy when she was in bed. Then we let her choose something from Toys r Us. The doll she picked remained in its box on the end of her bed until she had slept for one night without the dummy.

Worked a treat and she never looked back.

Bribery's a wonderful thing! [hgrin]

We weaned DC1 off them aged 3. We basically promised a police car at the end and said we would try and do it for a surprise for Daddy when he came back from his business trip. He was fine.

BUT, I think it would be mean (and a bit cruel) to do it so close to your new baby arriving as she will really need whatever comfort she can have at the moment. I'd leave it 6 months.