4.5 year old won't give up her dummy

[TaraW20]

We have tried everything.

My DS gave his up very easy but we just can't find anything to help.

Any suggestions?

Afraid you take it, chuck it out say they have gone to the baby elves in Santa’s workshop or whatever, and you stand firm. Get him a ‘thank you’ present from said baby elves to compensate. You prepare for a few days/nights of hell but trust me, she won’t still be kicking off when she is 15

I’d not bother trying to take it off her. The harder you try to get her to give it up, the harder she will cling to it. It’s not doing her any harm. It’s best not to make this a battlefield imho.

Yep, as previous poster said. Get rid. You'll have a hard 3/ 4 days but it'll be done.

Empathise with her that it's hard but explain to her why it's so important. Show her photos of what will happen to her teeth and tell her that is why the dummy fairy is coming with Santa to take the dummies away and give them to babies who need them. Get the dummy fairy to leave her something really special.

Never have dummies in the house again.

Why not just chuck it away while she's at school and say it's lost?

I don't understand this. It is doing her harm. I say this as a parent of a child who gave his up at 3 so I'm not averse to children holding on to comforts for a while. But she's 4 and a half. It's not difficult to take them away, it's not superglued to the child's mouth.

We cut holes in all of DS's dummies so they didn't work anymore. He would sadly hand them over as when they didn't work he didn't want them.

Take it away. Game over.

My son was just turned 4, we had just had another baby and he wanted his dummy all the time, it went from just for sleep to constantly and I’d had enough, honestly I thought omg he will never give it up. One day I just took them all. He asked for it at bedtime and I very casually said no they have gone now darling, he just fell asleep and never asked for it again 😱. Honestly, we had tried everything before that x

My DD was very attached to hers. She got a hole in her last one, I told her the shops didn’t make those ones anymore. She kept it, but couldn’t suck on it and just held it to go to sleep. After about a month she chucked it away.. she was 4y2m at the time. You could try cutting a hole in it, and then she’ll do the rest.

Just take it away?

Bribery worked for us, can't remember exactly what but it was a inexpensive figure or teddy of some sort and it was never asked for again

Is she the parent or you? Get a grip

I can’t believe people allow children to keep dummies until they are 4.

What do you mean she “won’t give it up”? Just throw it in the bin.

You've tried everything apart from taking the dummies away. Try that.

I get it, she'll kick off and it won't be pretty. Do it anyway. Sometimes life is tough. It's for her own good.

Any suggestions?

The bin?

Or I suppose you could leave it out for Santa, sort of like leaving a tooth in exchange for a coin from the tooth fairy.

It could well be damaging her teeth!

Just take it. Say Santa took it as she's a big girl now and doesn't need it! You will have to go cold turkey (pun absolutely intended!!)

Just get rid it will damage her teeth it can impact their speech. Just search them out make them disappear and say you are not allowed buy them for her and she gets xyz instead.

You are the parent - you just get rid of them and say that they have gone, make up a cute story about where if it makes you feel better but ultimately with children you do need to put in boundaries however unfashionable it is these days. (Plenty of other issues with modern child raising is also solved mostly by having fair age appropriate boundaries and red lines, this isn't about strict draconian parenting just ensuring that you as the adult aren't letting a child who doesn't have the capacity to understand the implications of their actions make bad decisions)

Yeah, splayed teeth, poor speech, jaw problems and not to mention excessive dependence on an object designed for infants is doing her no harm at all.

Personally I would wait until after Christmas. Christmas and Santa are so exciting and magical for kids and I wouldn’t want to ruin that by the looming fear of Santa coming to take away her biggest comfort items.

get Christmas out the way and tell her the dummy fairy is coming to take them away as she’s a big girl now. Then commit to it, take them away, cut them up and put them in the bin. In the morning the dummy fairy will have left a present for being such a big girl. Deal with the tears for a few days and she will forget all about it.

Yeah, you do need to do it. I can't remember the age for my four (I had two lots of 2, so a year apart but 5 years apart), but more like 18m -2 for the second of the two, and 2.5-3 for the first, and not allowed in the day. Mine hung onto them more than I would have liked at night, but there was a bit of a "fairness" thing going on given they were close in age. I wasn't paranoid about them, and they don't appear to have caused any harm. We told a story about the dodi fairy needing them for others rather than brutally chucking them in the bin. A couple of nights at most of bother, and not universally for all 4. But definitely no going back. They were also attached to another thing (blanket with two, bib with one, toy with another) and they were left as long as they needed them. I think the holes cut in cut also help, never thought of doing that. Good luck, stand firm. xx

My two children loved theirs. DS we only had one left and we lost it genuinely. Found years later in a book we opened then realised it was too old for him so put it away. As he could see we were looking everywhere he didn't blame us so you could try pretending to look for it. With DD she had a bad cold and couldn't use it so they vanished before she got better. You have my sympathy.

The dummy fairy worked for my daughter and the book Bea gives up her dummy.
She was adopted at 4 and was very attached to her dummies and just taking them away would have been too stressful as they gave her comfort. We ended up leaving them at a fairy door outside her room and the fairies left her little gifts in return.
Could you leave them for Santa’s Elves?

Take it, cut the teet off and bin it