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Original poster

Positive dummy ditching stories please

15 replies

Beccarollover · 04/10/2004 13:02

I think the time has come to ditch the dummy.

He is now 13 months and his sleep is deteriorating because he needs it to get back off in the night at about 2am.

Can anyone tell me why Im reluctant to take it away?

Is it possible to take it away for sleeps but still have it for comfort during the day sometimes?

Any strategies for removing it at this age?

OP posts:

Yorkiegirl · 04/10/2004 13:51

Message withdrawn

poppyseed · 04/10/2004 13:57

Can't you be heartless and just take it away? At 13 months you may not get the emotional heartache about the dummy fairy or the waving it goodbye with the dustbin men or whatever??!!
Don't mean to be harsh, sorry - just an idea

woodpops · 04/10/2004 13:58

I can't stand dummies and both ds and dd have one. THey don't have it in the day at all when they're at nursery but apparently they NEED it when they're at home. At presant I'm getting them used to the idea that they are going. Ds fully understands and when asked will tell you santa is taking his dummies to give to the new babies because they cry. And because he'll have been a good boy and given santa his dummies santa will leave him a sepcial presant. How good is that?? DD on the otherhand doesn't understand and I think I will struggle with her.

Original poster

Beccarollover · 04/10/2004 14:07

How would i teach him to get his own dummy - quite often he is lying right next to one but never picks it up!

OP posts:

SofiaAmes · 04/10/2004 14:08

I have no objections to dummies, but my children threw theirs out before 12 months. However, my dd switched her addiction to her bottle instead. We have JUST (yesterday) ended that era. The childminder stopped giving it to her for naps ages ago. She just turned two last week and I decided I'd had enough of getting up in the middle of the night to refill her bottle. So yesterday I told her that she was a big girl now and wasn't going to have a bottle anymore. We didn't give her one at naptime and she shrieked a lot, but eventually fell asleep. Then at night, I didn't give her one and she hardly even peeped before falling asleep. Hopefully that's the end of it.
I would probably give your ds a few more months, at which point you will feel happy about letting him cry for it for a long enough period of time that he will eventually give up.

Mum2Ela · 04/10/2004 14:12

Beccarollover - DD was a little bit older than your DS when I ditched the dummy (bout 18 months I think) - we just went cold turkey.

Here is the thread about it www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=8&threadid=22989&stamp=040429124702

(sorry can't do links).

It was a nightmare for about a day, then it was like she had completly forgotten about it. One thing I will say, we went cold turkey in April. A couple of months earlier we had tried just limiting using dummy for naps but this didn't work as she was at an age where she would ask for it during the day and just shout louder until we gave in!

Cold turkey was def the best way to go.

Hope it works out for you.

wickedstepmum · 04/10/2004 22:22

My twins had dummys till they were 3. Much too old but we made a big thing about them going on their 3 birthdays - and it worked. The awful moment was when I found myself desparately trying to stuff a dummy into a boy six months later when he had chickenpox and I was desparate to settle him! He would have none of it.

harrassedmum · 04/10/2004 22:41

I also tried the dummy fairy thanks to a suggestion on here, was it you yorkiegirl? Anyway, dd cried for about half an hour but settled to sleep ok. She did get some pennies under her pillow and a present and if she asked for the dummy back i said i would have to take her present back. She was quite a bit older though.

bronniemuldoon · 05/10/2004 12:36

We did the same as Mum2Ela. Our Ds was 16 months and had been having a dummy just for naps and very occasionally as a comfort during the day but he got wise to it and used to stand by his cot pretending he wanted to go for a nap when really he just wanted the dummy! We ended up having a horrible weekend of tantrums over it and my DH got completely fed up and took the hardline - ie they're all going in the bin tonight!!!

We did controlled crying that night for the first time (up till then he'd gone to bed brilliantly with the dummy) and was probably the worst half hour of my life. It didn't really work for us but I know it's been really good for other people. After that he was fine although it took us a couple of nights to twig that we now needed to leave his door open with a light on on the landing and potter around a bit upstairs after putting him down just so he didn't feel stuck in the dark on his own. It probably only took about 3 days to settle down and after that we never looked back.

I have to say if it had been up to me I would have done the Santa/dummy fairy thing and taken it away when he was older but I'm glad now that DH took a hard line as once it's gone, it's gone!

maretta · 05/10/2004 12:48

Rather than giving up the dummy could you try giving up putting it in his mouth.
When you give him a dummy during the day just hand it to him and see what he does.
If he learns to put them in his own mouth they won't be a problem in the night.

Mind you - although my ds will find his own dummy in the night if it suits him, he also knows their Mummy Summoning properties. He can also throw them all noisily on the floor and scream 'Mumma, Mumma' until I appera like some sort of human jack-in-the box.

Next Christmas when he's 2.5 teh dummies will be going to th epoor chidren who can't afford dummies in exchange for an xtra special pressie from Santa.

unknownlove · 06/10/2004 02:42

when my son danny was eighteen months old we struck a deal that as it was christmas we were going to ask santa to swap his dummy for something he could take to bed. we sat down and viewed the toys section of our catalogue, his choice was teddy that sang soft lullabys the head of this would also glow in the dark, added bonus that he could locate this when its dark. i used this method for almost everything i.e bottles nappies and on various occasions i.e his birthday or easter times when presents are exchanged from my understanding he didnt feel his dummy was taken away but that it was his choice to leave his dummy behind confidently taking that new step of becoming a big boy with his new toy. a little bit of give and take. we all raise our children to be able to make thier own choices as an adult with this method you give them a head start at an early age.

ernest · 06/10/2004 13:38

We ditched it on ds's behalf at 12 mth, because we don't like dummies on older children & were expecting so thought if we didn't do it then it would be years, and then even harder to do.

Chucked them all in the bin during nap time & that was that. Much less fuss than anticipating. Very glad we did it.

chloeb2002 · 06/10/2004 20:19

DD quit dummies at about 12 months too. Too young to appreciate any dummy faries tho, but she had one main brand of dummy that she liked and when they all died i wasnt going to ask the mother in law to send any from aus so i just refused to replace them. She never had a dummy 'in public' eg shopping but had one a chreche for the first stint. She was totally unfussed when hers went. I thought she may pinch other babies dummies at chreche but ignored tem too. Dont know i just went with when we had both seemed to have had enough? I also felt i was using the dummied more than her? witnessed a couple of other mums shutting up babies with them and felt uncomfortable with that? so enough was enough for me! just learnt to cope better with tantrums and sit back and accept thats part of growing up.... mine and hers!!

dibooth · 07/10/2004 20:49

I'm easy about dummies - our DD is 3 and DS is 2 and they used to have them all day and night! Now they have one at night only. Both spit them out once asleep, so it's cool. The likelihood is they'll be off them by Xmas based on how they've gone from full on to just at night in a few weeks. If they still want one at 4 I'll start with the bribery!

Original poster

Beccarollover · 07/10/2004 21:05

hmmmm thanks for all the stories.

I cant imagine that this will be an easy transition - there will be some relearning involved for him to learn to go to sleep without a dummy.

I have backpedalled a little bit and this week taken him off bottles so at least I can feel good about something that he is having all of his drinks from a cup....

Not sure what to do about dummies to be honest - Im just anticipating a huge upheaval for him.

OP posts:

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