Taking away the pacifier

So at our 18 month checkup the pedi told me to start taking away their pacifier during naps and have it completely gone by 2 :woah: This scares me to death!! They LOVE their paci's and I am freaking out about taking them away. I know they need to be taken away, but I dont' want to even think about how it's going to be. Right now, they have them when they sleep and sometimes in the car. If they are really tired and fussy I will also give in. I've tried to start taking them away more - like in the car, etc. How did you get rid of them? I've heard about cutting the end, anyone try that? Just looking for some encouragement that it is possible! Thanks!

 

I just got rid of them two months ago. We were on a "naps and bedtime only" plan and I waited until I could tell them why we were getting rid of them and have them understand why (giving them to another baby worked great since they have babies in their daycare they understand about them being smaller and well, babies.)

Then we did a countdown over one week. "In 7 nights we are going to give your binkies to a new baby." "In 6 nights" etc. The last night I let them put them in a box "for a new baby" and tossed it in the trash as soon as they went to bed. Of course between nights 7&1 we had to find all of the additional binkies and get rid of those stealthily.

ETA: they asked for them for two days afterwards, and slept poorly for about two weeks but they're fine now.

 

My dd still has hers and like Bex I have no intentions of getting rid of it until she can understand where it's going. For us it's going to the binkie fairy who will be taking them, and leaving dd a gift.
She only gets it for naps, bedtime, and car trips that she's going to nap on.
Totally your decision!

 

Ellie still has hers and I have no intention of taking it away. I am also too tired to deal with her transitioning plus a new baby so she'll continue to have it until we can make her understand where it's going. I'm not worried about her having the pacifier though and my ped didn't mention it.

 

I was getting tired of them crying in the night when they lost the pacis... and we have a summer trip in July and I thought it might be good to be rid of them by then... I heard a friend with twins who just let them pick out a new stuffed animal toy when they were out and about and then that night she took the pacis away w/o telling them and just snuggled them in bed w/their new toys. She did this at 24 mo. and claims there were no issues.

I did similar, though didn't really have anything that they picked out as a new toy... but I just took the pacis away one night and it was a little rough, but not too bad. it does take them a lot longer to get to sleep now though. If we weren't going on vacation, i might have waited a bit... Its really nice now that they don't whine and fuss for the paci though! Oh and the main reason we did end up taking them away was that my dd's pacis were all breaking... and I'd need to buy new ones anyway. my son's weren't in the best shape either but they weren't hazards yet.

I mainly wanted to wait to make sure that they didn't become thumb suckers! good luck!

 

We did the whole Binkie Fairy thing too (we did it at Easter and told her the Easter Bunny was going to take it to give to another baby that needed it) with our daughter and she didn't like it but it only took about 3 days for her to be able to sleep without it. Good luck!