To ditch the dummy or not?????

[BabyHaribo]

DS is 6months and cannot sleep without his dummy. He has a good routine and goes down fairly easily for naps and at bedtime but only with the dummy. He can usually sleep 6/7 hours at night before starting to wake for his dummy and then I go in and out to put it back in so am feeling pretty tired!

Do I take it away? Go cold turkey? Or wait until he can plug himself back in? I would really love to hear from others who have gone cold turkey as dreading it but I think it really needs to be done to save my sanity - will it be awful

What dummy are you using? Im using the MAM ones and they seem to stay in but before I discovered them I had a few near the cot so i could just plug and run! He's 10m now and I've just started using it for sleep times as he wanted it all the time and I'll get rid when hes near the 2yr old mark the same as I did with ds1. You do what you think is right for the both of you.

If you want to take the dummy away, rather than going cold turkey you could try a gentle method a la "No Cry Sleep Solution" - google Pantley Pull-off (no nothing rude will come up ) and use that method (which is for weaning them off breastfeeding to sleep but should work the same).

I don't think it will be long before your DS can plug himself back in though so you could just try littering the cot with dummies each night. DD2 uses a dummy at 14 months and I'm wondering when i should wean her off them, but she just seems so happy I think I'll wait till she's older.

Go cold turkey and take the dummy away! I hate the things - they cause no end of problems.
He'll cry for a couple of nights, then will forget all about it.

Well . . . for DS1 we got rid of the dummy just after he was 2. We went completely cold turkey on it (nasty mummy ) and on the 2nd night he grumbled a bit and on 3rd night he just accepted it. HOWEVER, the big downside for us was that he started waking earlier at 6am rather than the 7 or 7.30am he had slept to previously. I think he used to pop the dummy back in and it would quickly send him back to sleep.

With DS2 he still has a dummy at 18 months, but only for bedtime and when he is really struggling with teething. In the early days we used to put a few dummies around the cot too, in the hope that he would at least find one and not send them all down the side of his cot.

Go cold turkey! It will be the best thing you ever did! I agree, you will have 2 or 3 bad nights, but he will learn to settle without it. I don't have an issue with dummies per se, used them with both DDs, but once I started going in numerous times a night I decided enough was enough. I dreaded taking the dummy away both times, and both times it was a lot easier than I thought!

I used a dummy for 1 night...couldn't see the benefit when it fell out and was causing extra disturbance to everyone's sleep...chucked out and never used again...hellish!!!

Thanks for all the replies. I really want to get rid of it just a wimp at the crying it may cause
I know that DS will soon forget all about it will have a look at the pantley pull off and see what that's about thanks

Have you tried 6 month plus size dummy. Might stay in better. About 5/6 months I used to get up about 6 times a night to put DD's back in but she soon found it herself, now I only get woken up if it falls out the cot.
Take it away if you want to but don't feel you should if he likes it (he's only tiny)