Anyone Have Tips on Weaning Baby off Pacifier?

My daughter is 1 year and 10 months, and we are just now weaning her off her pacifier. so it can take awhile. it's hard and she can get moody sometimes. anyway, i have advice as to not having to get up at night when the pacifier falls out of his mouth. I was told this by someone else, and it worked. he has to learn to look for his pacifier by himself. if you have too, put 2 or 3 wherever he sleeps, so when he drops one, he can find another one faster so you don't have to get up to find it. my daughter was doing this too, and it was hard getting up in the middle of the night. it didn't take her very long to realize she needed to look for it herself. she'd whine for a little bit, then find it and go back to sleep. good luck!

When you are ready to wean him off the paci, you can poke a hole it in it. We did this with my son when he was around 2ish and since it didn't have the same suction effect he didn't want one anymore.

Sounds like he still needs it. He will get rid of it when he is done.

My son gave his up completely on his own around 5 1/2 months... so maybe you could just wait a little and he'll give it up by himself? It can happen.

The method we used for our daughter (who gave hers up ON her 2nd birthday) wouldn't work for a child as young as yours. She gave them away (ALL of them) in a trade with the lady at the bakery for some toys. :)

I think doing it now is smarter then waiting until they are three and can tell you what they think of you taking it! I would just go cold turkey with a little one that size. It will suck for a couple of days. Luckily, they dont have that great of memory span. So after a few days he should be ok.

Waiting until later is horrible. I had two kids on binkies...one the was three and one that was four. They would talk around them and through them...it was annoying. We tried nine times...yes you read this right...nine times to take them away. They had hidden stashes. Finally our saving grace was, my middle guy have root canals done at the hospital. The dentist had a long talk with him about binkies. Then and only then did he let me get rid of his...then it was just a matter of getting my oldest off of his....

Good luck mamas!!! just know it will not be bad after a few days!!

I never gave any of my kids a pacifier. I will never forget when I delivered my first child and they brought him in the room he had a paci in his mouth. I pitched a fit and told the nurse not to give my child one. I told her how lots of my friends had the same issue on trying to wean their kids from paci. My mother never gave any of us paci. She said it was a hospital policy. Needless to say, I made it perfectly clear with my other children no paci either. But my best friend was going thru the same issue as you. She told me she just could not get her son off the paci. So one day, I got to baby sit him for the day. He was 6 months old at the time. I told him he was a very big boy now and that he did not need paci. I told him to throw paci in the trash can and he did. I had both of my kids make a really big thing about what he had just done. They went to playing for a while and when my husband got home he took the trash to the road. The trash man came by and there went the trash. We all stood outside with him and we all wavied by by to paci as we told him paci gone gone. He cried for about 15 minutes and we had to remind him paci gone gone because he was a very big boy and mom would be so proud of him. That was the end of paci. My girlfriend could not believe it when she picked him up that night. Good luck.

Never had the problem ourselves, as our little one wouldn't take to the pacifier. (He would give it a couple of good sucks, but when he determined there wasn't any milk to follow, he would spit it out and yell in frustration). We are big fans of Dr. Ferber's sleep training. Progressive waiting, will help you with overcoming this pacifier sleep association.

1. it involves some crying (but hey you are dealing with crying anyway every time the paci falls out of his mouth).
2. it will take some work on your part.
3. you've got to be fully committed. If you relent and give him the paci after 15 minutes of crying, all he learns is I need to cry for 15 minutes.
4. It might take up to a week, but once you have nipped this, the paci will no longer be a problem.

Good luck.

I had the same problem for a while at around the same age. I battled through to six months, and then did 'teach to sleep' (six months is the minimum age for this). It worked like a dream. One of the teach to sleep principles is that the child has no pacifiers, bottles, rocking, patting etc to help them get to sleep. It can take up to a week, but never took more than one night for each of my three boys. In fact it took just 20 minutes for my oldest to get with the program and he never looked back. My other boys did have their pacifiers when they weren't sleeping until 2 - 3 years. When I'd had enough, I told the boys that when people get too old for pacifiers they start to taste yucky. Then I painted the pacifiers with Stop n Grow for nail biting which is safe, but tastes very bitter. This also worked a treat and the kids simply didn't want them anymore. I did this the other day with my three year old who refused to give up his milk bottle. I am a mean mean mother!

I didn't take my daughter's away until she was 3... I was able to explain to her she was too big for the paci now, she understood, and that was that. No problems. Both of my girls were paci addicts and I never had any problems with them sleeping at night. But I think it would be easier to take it away before they turn 1. Then again, he's too young for CIO, so if you take that away, you will have to replace it with something else. Lovie of some sort? If it were me I would just let him have it. But good luck!

Do some research. I read something in the hospital when I gave birth (to my 8 month old) that using a pacifier at night can help lower the risks of SIDS. I am not trying to frighten you but your baby is at the age that is the greatest liklihood of SIDS. Why would you want to take the paci away? He isn't old enough to sleep train yet - virtually everything says at least 6 months AND double his birth weight. Most of what I have learned this time around (my older is 5) is that it is normal for babies to need to eat once during a 12 hour night until at least 9 months.

As was suggested, have your son do a lot of tummy time and then put multiple pacis in the crib. My son has been able to find his paci since he was 6 months. He only uses it at night and naps. We keep it in his bed. I am happy that he is using it and will encourage until he is 12 months because I believe in doing whatever I can to reduce the SIDS risk (we also installed a ceiling fan in his room for the same reason). He has had a strong need to suck since birth (he sucked his thumb in utero). At 12 months, we'll see how it goes. Baby has a big brother so he may give it up himself just to be a big kid. If not, I'll figure something out then. My pediatrician said we can discuss at 18 months if he is still using it.

I am a little confused. If a baby needs his pacifier, why do you want to take it away? My mom took mine away when I was a baby because she didn't want her child to suck on one. I ended up sucking my finger because I obviously needed it. The problem with fingers is you can't just get rid of them. So I sucked my finger until I was in eigth grade! I made sure my kids had a pacifier when they were babies, and when they were three they were done. I am not being judgemental, I really just don't understand taking away something that soothes them.

Taking it away is when your problems will really begin. I would look into the reason why he cannot self soothe. perhaps he has a self regulation issue, undiscovered. This many times is a sign of something bigger. I would have his suck, swallow, breathe checked out because maybe he is not suckling enough at his feeds and still has a great need for sucking. Sucking is a necessity and should never be discouraged. The hand/mouth connection, the foot/mouth connection, the core/mouth connection and the brain/body/mouth connection are all being formed now. Do not worry about taking sucking away until 2-3 yrs old. Limit it to the bed but don't take it away. At 5 months he is not able to find the pacie and put it back in but this is temporary for another week or two when he will be able to. Give him tons of tummy time so it will encourage him to seek and reach.

He may need it- if his cranial bones are out of balance then sucking helps, and sooths, and therefore will help sleep. A webster trained chiropractor, craniopath will help. Take the pacifer away when it is needed, and you can trade that for thumb sucking.
Really it is strange that pacifiers have become a problem for parents, thinking that they should take them away, if fact it is often therapuetic for the baby,
best, k

I agree with Julia S.

my oldest took a paci until about 5 months, I kept shoving it in his mouth and at daycare they only gave it to him when he cried and couldn't be consoled so I just took it off him one day and he was fine. My secound son was a pacifier junky. He was over a year when we finally just hid it from him and refused to give it to him. I got so sick of going in his room to find it after he spit it out and then wanted it. I think he is already aware he "needs" it. Is he getting a tooth? If there is one about to pop then I would wait until it comes through he may be soothing his gums. You could just not give it to him at naptime and eventually he will sleep longer it may take a couple days or so. At night you may have to just tough it out and keep soothing him back to sleep when he cries for it. He is very young so it may not take as long as it would and older child,my niece is 3.5 and freaks out when she can't have her pacifier....so I see where your coming from with not wanting him to become too attached to it. Good Luck

I've never weaned mine off the pacifier that young so I don't have any great advice for you on that and I know you said you've already made up your mind that you ARE going to wean him, but, IF you decide not to maybe a different KIND of pacifier would work better for him. Some are easier to keep in than others and you might not have the problem of it falling out. I also liked "first time mama's" idea of putting a few in bed with him so he can find one himself.
I know you didn't ask for suggestions on how to keep the pacifier but JUST in CASE! :o) (Sometimes we change our minds after weeks with no sleep haha!)
Oh! And BTW...we took our kids "lala's" away at 1 except at night then we shoot for age 2 to take it away at night)

I tried when my son was 6 months, and I felt like I was torturing him. :( But, as soon as he turned 13 months, I took it cold turkey. Its been 2 months paci free. He doesn't even remember it and it very good at self soothing. So cold turkey worked best for me. Consistency and patience play a major role in this process. Ear plugs may help as well! LOL. Good Luck!

Mine used paci's till they were almost 2, so I dont know what to tell ya. Just take it away and he'll eventually learn to suck his thumb or go without. There is no easy solution. Stuffing the paci back in during the night is much easier than getting up and feeding. He is only 5 mos, he might be hungry even when he wakes up in the night?

We took pacifiers away from our kids "cold turkey" at 10 months old - poof they were gone! Only one of my kids (I have four) had a hard time with it, but honestly after a few days he was fine.

Good luck!