So, Preston and I have been putting off taking away Arden's binkie for toooo long. We have been meaning to do it for months now, but just never have done it. The first (and probably most important) reason we have been stalling was FEAR. Yes, we are afraid to take a 2-year old's binkie away. I have been totally dreading it, because if you know Arden, you know that naptime and bedtime are the only two times of day when she is quiet and still, and those are very special times for me and my sanity! If I lose out on much naptime or bedtime, losing my mind is not far behind :) I decided today that another, mostly subconscious reason I may have been reluctant to take away Arden's binkie is that the binkie is the very last babyish thing she has left.
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Whatever the reasons, we have been making up excuse after excuse to put it off. First, it was, "Let's wait until we get back from vacation, she will need the binkie on vacation so she can sleep in the hotel room," then it was "Let's wait until after she is used to Daxton being around," then it was "Let's wait until she is all potty trained because we don't want to throw too many things at her at once." Well, I can't think of any more excuses, so we have been just waiting for the right time (which could have gone on indefinitely).
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Anyhoodle...yesterday, Arden was putting up a little bit of a fight over taking her nap like she occasionally does. Preston, thinking he had come up with the best threat ever, said something to Arden like "You can either stay in your bed and take a nap, or you can get out of bed and throw your binkie in the garbage." Arden smiled and said "Binkie in garbige!!" jumped out of bed, ran down the stairs and threw her binkie away. Preston was stunned, and didn't quite know what to do. But, we thought we would just go for it and see what happened.
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Last night at bedtime, she whined for her binkie a little bit, but she pretty much went to sleep without it surprisingly quickly. "Wow," I thought to myself, "we should have just done this months ago, that was easy!" She slept through the night just fine too! This morning as soon as she woke up she whined for it for a few minutes, but I distracted her with breakfast and everything was good. Then, naptime rolled around. She asked for binkie a couple of times and I explained to her (for about the 72nd time) that she is a big girl now and needs to learn to go to sleep without a binkie. She smiled at me, nodded her head, and said "No binkie! I a big dirrooh (girl)!" I thought that we were home free! However, that is when the whining REALLY started. She never asked for her binkie after that, she just kind of whined wordlessly for the next, ohhh...hour and fifteen minutes. I tried extra rocking, extra lullabies, everything. She finally went to sleep with no binkie! Yaaaay! I was frazzled, but triumphant!
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My happiness was short-lived, because she woke up about 45 minutes later (she usually naps for 2 hours or so), and I heard her over the monitor making some sad smacking noises with her lips. Then, she started in on the wordless whining again. I tried for another 45 minutes or so to get her to go back to sleep and finally gave up and let her be awake.
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So, we are now on bedtime #2 non-binkie. We usually start putting her down around 8:30, and she is usually down for the night by 9. It is now 10:11 p.m., and I just put her back in bed for about the 7th time. She still isnt' asking for the binkie, but she is having a really hard time going to sleep, and I know she has to be exhausted. Aaaand, there she is coming down the stairs again. I guess I better go and be mean mommy now. Wish us luck! Does anyone have any brilliant ideas about this? Or at least an estimate of how long it will take until life gets back to normal?
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At least it gives me something to think about besides our 401(k)s evaporating...
7 comments:
We held on the the binkie for a long time too, but it didn't take long for the girls to get used to life without it.
As far a getting out of bed, a friend of mine gave us an idea from the book, "Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child" (or something similar to that). They recommended that the first time they get out of bed you can kindly put them back, telling them it's bedtime and not to get out of bed again. If they get out of bed again you simply pick them up and put them back in bed without talking to them at all. You do that again and again, but in theory when they don't get that attention they stop. It worked great (and quickly) for both of my girls. Good Luck!
Today was pretty crappy again...It took about 2 hours of hard fighting to get her to take a nap. I tried your advice, and ended up putting her quietly back to bed about 67 times (not exaggerating) But, she went right to sleep tonight! Yay!
give her back her binky....but poke holes in it so its flat. That is the only way I could get kaden to not want his (sadly, the excuses we came up with moving and kinley being born got him to be 2.5) Everytime he wanted it, I gave him the one that had a flat. Eventualy, he didnt want it cuz it was broke.
I hate getting rid of the binky! BUT, getting Hailey to stop sucking her thumb was worse!!
Good luck. I promise she wont be asking for it when she is in pre-school LOL :)
Hang in there. We also had Jackson throw his away. I did it a little earlier which maybe made it a litte easier. Good Luck! She will live without it.
Hang in there! She will eventually be able to manage with our the Binkie! As for the getting out of bed, we will tell our kids that we will take away their stuffed animal that they slept with and if they still got up we will take away their pillow and so forth. When they realize we meant business, they stayed in their room.
Oh man! You are not getting me excited to do this with Camden. I think I will keep putting it off too! Hope you are hanging in there!
Our kids all have a stuffed animal they sleep with so we've been lucky taking away binkies. They don't get too upset becasue they still have one of their 'snuggle buddies' to sleep with.
Grace had a harder time giving it up, I think because Matthew was a newborn and got to have one when we started taking hers away. She would steal his away and then sneak some sucking in before we would catch her. Telling her she was a big girl and didn't need the baby binky anymore worked after that. Although, even now she will sometimes steal Matthew's binky. I guess it all takes time. :)
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