getting rid of the dummy....

[alanevo]

hello,

I am a father so hope I am ok posting on "mumsnet"....

We have a 1 yr old boy who was born 14 weeks prematurely. He is doing really well in his development considering all he has gone through but obviously is really like 8 and a half month old baby.

He sleeps in our room still in his own cot. He normally fights his sleep and to get him off after his final bottle around 7pm ish, we give him a dummy and cuddle him off to sleep. However, and this is the problem, he wakes 5+ times a night and will not settle or go back to sleep until we have put the dummy back in his mouth. Does anyone have any suggestions how we can wean him off his dummy so that we can try to get him to sleep right through ?

It has not been a problem in the past (because my wife has taken a year off from work and has always seen to him during the working week, with me doing likewise at weekends) but my wife is now going back to work.

I am aware that this is not a major problem but a bit of advice would be helpful.

Cheers

Hi there - my DD was the same, except we had a minimum of 10 night wakings, but it got hugely better at 7 months when she cut her first tooth and I started shovelling in the porridge. Now at 9 months she sleeps through - she still goes to sleep with the dummy and a cuddle, but settles herself in the night without us or the dummy (which has usually fallen through the cot bars by then).

Not sure that is much help, except to maybe give you some hope that your son might solve this one by himself.

Our DD went through something similar at around 9 months. We bought some breathable bumpers for the cot which meant she couldn't throw them out, we also put a few dummies in the cot so if she lost the first one, she might find another herself. These things helped for us. She's now nearly 16 mo & she only has her dummy for sleep but we're now thinking when is the time to get rid of it. So having got through the night waking stage we're now worried she may be of an age where she gets too attached to it!

Are you already using the little straps you can use to clip them onto the baby's clothing?

If you are but he's still waiting for you to put it in for him I'd suggest gritting your teeth and teaching him to find it and put it back in himself.

Start by putting it in his hand instead of his mouth then move onto just putting his hand onto it. Hopefully after a few nights he'll have learned to find it himself and will just reach for it himself when he wakes.

If you haven't got one of these little straps I can highly recommend getting one.

Is there a reason he is still in your room? My eldest went from sleeping through to waking frequently at about 6 months. She had a dummy too. We put her in her own room and she started sleeping through again (still with the dummy).

thanks for the advice...never really thought of putting the dummy in his hand so he learns to do it himself. Will definately try that this evening...along with a load of dummies in his cot.

He was "oxygen dependant" when he came home from hospital and the hospital have only just discharged him and all the oxygen tanks etc removed from our home, hence he is still in our room. It is easier if he is in our room until the crying for a dummy scenario is sorted.

Thank you for taking time to help me....
Cheers.

My point was that moving DD out of our room sorted the problem - she was waking and staying awake because she was aware we were there. Once she was in her own room she didn't bother as we weren't there. Obv I can see you may want DS near for health reasons.

Hi,

We solved the "having to get up and search for dummy" issue by using one of DDs comforters with soft cloth appendages to tie dummies to. That way she could always find them herself at night.

We'd tried the lots of dummies in the cot and it sort of worked but more often than not she'd end up accidentally pushing them all out of the cot whilst rummaging for them.

We did this when she was 5 months old and have not heard from her at night since.

We did think about taking her dummy but I didn't have the heart. She only has dummy at sleeptimes and her comforter with the dummies stays in the cot and she is happy with that (and so are we).

www.balloonsweb.co.uk/store/product.asp?spc=4126WH

Above is the type of comforter we used to tie the dummies to. We were given it as a present when DD was born and it has turned out to be best gift so far. (and yes we've bought spares...).

Worth a try.

Our son was given a muslin cloth and a dummy from day one and so when he started waking in the night looking for his dummy I took it away after three sleep less nights. I let him put them in the bin with me and told him he was a big boy now so no need for a dummy anymore. Two nights later we have never looked back. You have to be able to stand a bit of crying themselves to sleep but it was the right move for us. He cried 20 mins the first sleep and less the following nights. He's now back to sleeping 11 to 12 hours a night.

I would not advocate giving your child a substitute to the dummy as you will have issues with that one day also.
Good luck

DS2 has one of these also to hold his dummies. I attach at least two dummies to it so when he's cuddling bunny he can find one.

Alanevo, we had just the same problem as you! We got the Sleepytot which lynniep recommended and honestly have never looked back! :)