Bye bye dummie

[mummylifeofsmilesandtears]

Hello, planning to get rid of my sons dummy so just getting the plan ready and thought I'd ask other parents for their ideas, experiences and suggestions that could help a smoother transition.

How did you remove the dummy, where did you tel you child it had gone or ideas to involve them giving it away etc

My son is approaching two and a half years of ages. He uses the dummy for comfort such as for bedtime sleep, naps, car journeys, tired after nursery, asks for it if he's in the pram, watching cartoons relaxing he will ask for it. He doesn't have it during nursery and he doesn't have it whilst he is playing with toys in the house, out in the garden or out at the park or activities etc and happily passes it to me without me asking so I guess it is more of a sleep association / comfort / relaxation aid for us. He does have a soft comforter snuggy too that we use but the pair are usually hand in hand.

Did you fully remove the dummy or use it purely only use it at bedtime? If so ideas of how to do this or did you try this an made it harder and confusing.

Open to lots of suggestions and ideas.
Thanks everybody x

Literally was going to post the same thread soon so place marking. We have discussed reducing down to bedtime only for a while then seeing how DS goes.

We did cold turkey with DS at 2.5 - he only had it for naps in the cot and bedtime. Took a couple of days and a fair bit of upset but after that he was fine and never mentioned it again, even when we had dummies in the house with DC2

I think if you've been giving it for comfort during the day then you're probably in for a rough ride. I think I'd tackle daytime first and then sleeping. Would he be interested in the dummy fairy? My DS didn't really have the understanding at that age but some of his friends got the idea and handed theirs over in exchange for a present!

For both my children we told them the Dummy Fairy needed the dummy for baby fairies (I know, I know....)
The Dummy Fairy would bring them a present to swap for the dummies. My DD chose a Peppa Pig house (small but she really really wanted it). Then she decided which day she would give it up and hung up her dummy on the hook and the next day there was the house.
My DS was more stubborn and we thought he'd be going to university with his. He wanted a Hot Wheels track but there was zero sign of him giving up.
Then one night at bedtime he just said "I want the hot wheels track" and handed me the dummy. Massive panic as we hadn't yet bought the damn thing. Had to stumble about saying you need two nights with no dummy then the present appears - then scurried off to the shops in the day.
It worked for both of them and they both happily gave up the dummies (DD 2.5 and DS 3.something)
There were days when they both said they wanted their dummy back but we said you'll have to give back the toy - then they decided against it.

We had reduced it down to just bedtime before that. Dummy stayed in the bed. They would sometimes just get in bed to have a suck of the dummy.

We've just started slowly phasing it out. My son now only has the dummy for nap and at bedtime (previously it was also for general comfort and when going outside too). Like DoYouWantDecking, the dummy now stays out of sight in the cot and my son already seems to have forgotten that he used to have it at other times :) Good luck!

This is a few years ago now but from what I remember with two of our DCs, we’d weaned them off having them unless they were going to bed, and also didn’t start on this if they were ill or out of routine.

DC1’s dummy was “lost”. This worked ok except for her finding some spares but they were “lost” too. It was all very mysterious.

Didnt have the same sort of patience for DC2 so his was slowly chopped up over several days until there was only a tiny bit of the teat left and he could literally only hold it on the edges of his teeth which obviously did not give him the same satisfaction as he couldn’t suck on it. It was “broken”, again this was rather mysterious and we were sympathetic about it. However if you’re chopping up a dummy you do need to be careful that whatever remains will not be a choking hazard.

I think both ours were fine within a week or so but they did also have snuggle toys or blankets as comforts too.

Thanks for all the ideas! I am thinking I will tackle day time first so that he's not upset during the day aswel as the night I feel this would be emotionally draining and too much. Just thought he may get confused but I guess il just have to explain the dummy is only for bedtime and get a new 'bedtime dummy'

Love the dummy fairy idea but I don't think he knows what a fairy is. But he understands the concept of babies so I think he would grasp to the idea that he's a big boy now and the little babies need the dummy etc

I will start to ween the dummy during the day and see how it goes an then if it's not working too well I will go for fully removing of a day with a story of fairy's and baby's or something! And then just have to ride out the day time tears and hope it passes after a few days.

Thanks everybody xx
Just wondering how old were yours when you decided to get rid of the dummy?

I tried a bit of sneaky psychology on my son. I said that it was time he gave up having a dummy - and the anticipated ructions ensued. So then I said Ok, if he didn't like that idea, he could have the dummy indoors at home but not outdoors. He happily agreed to that.
So when we went out, I put the dummy in the kitchen and he helped himself to it when we returned. Then I moved it - still in the kitchen but not in sight so he had to ask for it. Quite quickly, he forgot to ask for it and had given up using it.

It's spring, the birdies need dummies for their babies. Watch the birdies and, when you're ready, we'll swap it for a beautiful tin (with biscuits)
for you to collect treasures in.