Since before Maddison was one year old she was only allowed to have a pacifier in bed. I should have taken the binky away a long time ago, but I just never wanted to. I knew it would not go well. Now she is at the age where she totally understands what you are saying to her and in my opinion way too old for a binky anymore. So Matt and I decided that today would be the day that we would break her of the binky habit.
After she woke up today Matt grabbed the binky and put it away without her seeing. When nap time rolled around she had just gotten in trouble and was upset. When I told her it was nap time she got even more upset. I thought to myself 'great, this is never going to work' because she is already upset and she needs to be in a reasonable state of mind when I talk to her about this and she is a typical, unreasonable two year old when she gets upset. Against my better judgment I put her in bed without her binky anyways.
She of course cried and did not want to lay down for her nap. I told her it was nap time and left her room. She cried for a couple of minutes and then started saying "mom I need my binky, momma where is my binky, I want my binky" over and over again. I was feeling bad because I knew it was even harder to not have a binky because of being in trouble before, so I caved...I walked in her room, handed her the binky and said "it's time to go to bed now." She did with no more protest. After nap time I had Matt distract her and I took her binky out of her crib again.
With the dreaded time approaching I began thinking of my game plan for this time. I told her it was bed time and she went with very little protest as usual. She laided down with her baby, cup of water and blanket as usual and then I saw the light go off in her head... "Where's my binky?" she says. Crap! I guess I was hoping she wouldn't even notice...haha wishful thinking.
I began moving her blanket and baby around acting as though I were looking for the binky. I said "I don't know where your binky is baby." No joke, she looked straight at me and said "you took it away." I couldn't believe it, I totally screwed myself by giving it to her for nap time because now she realized I had taken it away then.
"I didn't take it away honey, I don't know where it is"
"Need to look for it, I need my binky"
"I just looked for it and I didn't see it"
"look more"
"I can't look more right now, it's dark outside and I can't see anything, we'll have to look in the morning"
"my binky is outside?"
"I don't think it is outside but we can look in the morning"
"binky isn't outside, it's inside"
"oh, ok. Well it's dark inside too, so we can look in the morning when it's light"
"I threw my binky, it's under all my toys, you look"
"I can't see in all of your toys right now because it's dark, we can look in the morning"
Knowing no matter what I said she would have another option for me to try I decided it was time for Matt to try. He walks in and then I step right out into the hall so I can hear but not be seen by Maddison. Matt asks her what is the matter, as if he didn't know. haha. At this point it is getting hard not to start laughing. She wont really answer him, she doesn't want to tell him for some reason.
Matt says "ok well I love you, I'll see you in the morning, goodnight."
"I can't find my binky!"
"oh. Well I'll look for it," he says as he pretends to look through her crib just as I had done.
At this point I can tell he is amused, but still playing along.
"I don't see it babe, we can look for it in the morning"
In the saddest little disappointed voice Maddie says,
"yeah... that's what mom said..."
I could tell Matt wanted to laugh, but he held it together. He says,
"Well if we can't find it tomorrow, daddy will take you to the store and buy you a new one"
"oh, I can go with you"
"yeah you can go with me to the store"
"oh ok"
"ok be a big girl and go nite nite. I love you"
"love you"
Matt closed her door and we both started laughing as quietly as we could. 30 minutes later I opened the door to see if she was sleeping. She heard the door open and turned over to see me.
"hi baby"
"hi"
"Are you gonna go nite nite?"
"yeah, daddy says I'm a good girl"
"you are a good girl, now go to bed ok, love you"
"k love you, nite"
Surprisingly, there was no crying from her at all though. She went to sleep fine without it. I asked Matt what he was going to do tomorrow when she wants to go to the store and get a new one. He said I'm not sure, change the subject? I suggested we go to the store and skip the binky isle and go to the toy isle and tell her they don't have any binky's but they have big girl toys and she can have one of those instead of her binky.
I think it will work, if she gets through tonight no problem we should be in the clear! Although, we will have to do some good "looking for binky" inside AND outside tomorrow just to make her believe it is really lost. LOL
*UPDATE*
This morning Matt was asking Maddison if she wanted to go get a new binky, the first few times she would say yes and then Matt would say "no you don't, babies use binkys, you're a big girl, you don't want a binky." After a few times it worked and now if you ask her if she wants a binky she says "no, I'm a big girl!" She took a nap, no problem, without her binky. If I had known it was going to be this easy I would have done it a long time ago!!!!
