Weaning from a soother

My boys are almost a year old and, well, one of my guys has an addiction..to his soother. Pretty normal I know, but I think it is time for it to go bye bye! They will be heading to daycare soon and I would like to try to have him weaned from it before then. He has it for naps, nighttime, and he likes to just have it in his mouth if we are playing, just because. He has even managed to figure out how to smile and not let the soother fall out of his mouth. The worst is when he is sleeping and wakes up an realizes that his soother is on the floor he freaks out!
So what are your experiences is weaning from the soother? How did you do it? Did you just take it away cold turkey, out of sight, out of mind? Or did you gradually wean it out?
Any advice or thoughts would be GREATLY appreciated!
Thanks in advance!

 

I never attempted it until they were much older...Justin and Josh were both around 2.5 when we got rid of it! And we had a whole "ceremony" to get rid of it! With him being so young, I would guess the only way to do it would be cold turkey. Good luck, let us know how it goes!

 

For us with DS1 we only gave it to him at naps and at nap time. After a few weeks we only gave it to him at night times. Then after a few weeks of that we took it completely away. I have also heard of cutting the end off of it to make it less appealing and soothing to thte child. HTH! Good luck!

 

Thanks for your replies! Well, it has only been today so far, but (knock on wood), it has been going better than expected. We have tried no soother for his two naps today and he cried both times for a few minutes, but eventually he fell asleep. Now we shall see how bed time goes.........

 

That's great! Hope it continues to go well!

 

Just because they are headed for daycare, doesn't mean you have to get rid of them. Our pedi said by 3-4 they should be off of them. Mine still have theirs, for naptime, nighttime and car rides. It is definitely not an out of sight out of mind thing either... they ask for it, when it is out of sight.

Good luck with your decision.

 

Thank you for your input everyone. The more I think about it, the more I am not sure if it is a good idea or not. We will see how it goes, but I am not going to push it. Thanks again.

 

Well, day 2 of no soother and so far so good....

 

:clapping: That's great!!! :clapping:

 

My older DD had used a binky since she was a newborn but her *addiction* became much worse around 14-15 months. At that time she started wanting one in her mouth & one to hold - sometime two. At 2 we kept it just in the crib for naps & bedtime & at 2 1/2 went cold turkey (after putting it in a bear at build -a-bear.) Sleeping was a nightmare for about 6 weeks!! So...H & N will be giving theirs up before their birthday - probably cold turkey. I think at your sons age they would adjust pretty quickly.