How to get 7m off his dummy & self settle??

[u32ng]

Hello, I'd appreciate any advice/personal success story on ditching the dummy. Also, how many days/weeks is it going to take to accomplish?

My DS has been having a dummy for daytime naps since about 4.5m old. I've wanted to get rid of it before now as I could see negative sleep associations developing (needing it to nap; waking up crying when it fell out etc) However I decided he was too young & to do it when he was older - which is now.

He is waking in the night & evidently can't self settle as leaving him for a bit usually results in more crying, but as soon as I put a muslin next to his face he settles down & eventually goes back to sleep, at which point I remove the muslin for his own safety. Although he sometimes wakes & i have to start again with the muslin-sleep-remove charade. I want him to learn to go back to sleep on his own when he wakes between sleep cycles. I sometimes wish he would be a thumb sucker as at least it's always there!!

Anyway, for daytime naps it's: dummy + blanket + heartbeat noise on his slumber frog.
For bedtime it's: just a muslin (thankfully no dummy here but he obviously has a bit of a suck-to-sleep habit)

However if I try to nap him without the dummy (like this morn) he eventually melts down into over tiredness & then it requires the dummy AND me holding him tightly to settle down.

I want to ditch this blasted dummy as it is becoming a total pain!

I tried everything and was pulling out my hair. Eventually I pierced a hole in the dummy (making sure it was safe to still use) and let DD use it for a couple of days. She noticed it lost the soothing sucking motion as it kept deflating but she carried in using it. I then cut off a tiny bit of the tip (making sure it was safe to still use and kept checking every few minutes throughout the day in case she had bitten through the plastic but it was fine as she didn't have many teeth). She noticed it wasn't quite right but she carried in using it. Every few days I kept snipping a bit more until eventually she was crawling around with no teat left. She still liked to hold it before bed but after a couple of weeks forgot about it. It saved us all going through the tears and heartache of trying to deprive her, after all she'd had it all her short life and it was her best friend:)

BUT PLS BE CAREFUL YOU DO NOT WANT DS TO BITE AT IT AND SWALLOW ANY DEBRIS.

Dummies aren't Satan's nipples! My DS never cried when it fell out - woopee doo for us, I suppose.

Has your DS got a noono, ie comfort blanket/favoutite teddy? Our DS was gifted a little teddy holding a blanket, at each corner of the blanket is a knot which he LOVES! He'll often suck one of those knots rather than the dummy. Perhaps replacing the dummy with something else would help? Otherwise, why take away something that comforts?

He has sooo many 'noono's'! I'm just scared to give him them for sleeping in case he suffocates or something (he's a blanket over the face kind of boy!)

I know the dummy soothes, but i'm only wanting to get rid of it because I think it's negatively affecting his night sleep by crying because he doesn't really know how to go back to sleep unless he can suck on something.