Hi, my name is Amanda and my son is addicted to his pacifiers. Well, he was until we put him on a 12-step program. It started innocently enough when he was about 2 weeks old. He got his first paci. And then he lost it and since they came in a two-pack, we gave him the other one. So I bought another pack so we would always have a backup (yes, I was his enabler). Then we found the first one and now there were three. Fast-forward 18 months and we were up to having ownership of 10 pacifiers and had to have 4 with us at all times.
It was bad. It was like he was James Dean in a movie with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth at all times. He hoarded them. He stashed them around the den so in the event he needed his fix, he could immediately get to one. He brought them to the dinner table and tried to use them to dip into his yogurt or vegetables. And then came the breaking point....he started to talk with them in his mouth. That was our last straw. The pacis had to go. We developed our own 12-step program.
1. Cut the tips off 2 of the pacis in the rotation each day until all paci tips are cut.
2. Drop down to having only 4 pacis in the rotation.
3. Add one cut paci to the 3 whole pacis at night and at naps.
4. Add 2 cut pacis to the 2 whole pacis at night and at naps.
5. Add 3 cut pacis to the 1 whole paci at night and at naps.
6. Switch to only cut pacis.
(By this point, he was definately losing interest. He sometimes wanted to hold them but didn't want to suck on them). Progress was being made. We also had never limited him to having them anywhere in the house but by this point, they were staying in his room. He stopped asking for them.
7. Don't snuggle with pacis while reading books before bed, leave them in the crib.
8. Take away 1 paci at night - now there are only three.
(This is where we are currently at)
We'll continue to dwindle down to no pacis in the crib on Saturday night.
So between now and Saturday, we just have to make sure we have found all of his stash.
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