Anyone Ditched The Dummy Around 4 Months?!

[CoreysMummy]

Sorry if this turns into a long drivvle...

Corey, although he has reflux at night has always slept well, and when waking in the night for food, would eat and go straight back down!! Iv never, ever had a night of him screaming/fussing for an hour or anything. (I might be a biatch here, I dont know).

He goes to bed at 7pm, and usually wakes between 4-6 for a bottle. Iv NEVER ever had him wake up any time before like 1am just snuffling around, pop his dummy back in and hes off instantly - this may happen twice a week if im unlucky.

Well now, he could wake 3 times before 4am, has his dummy, snuffles about and goes back to sleep. I cant carry on like this, its a joke. He is teathing I believe, and does suffer from very severe acid reflux (under control for the most part with drugs and prescription milk). He used to use the dummy to help soothe, as when sucking the acid cant come up again... so I feel bad taking it off him... but he is on heeps of meds now, and with this waking increasing, I cant go to work if he aint sleeping well.

My only worry is, what do I do in the night if/when he wakes, if I usually poke it in and bobs your uncle?! Also in the day when hes winging, and he gets his dummy, shuts up for 3 mins, pushes the dummy out of his mouth so he can chew on his fist and carrys on happy as larry... what do I do to get him to shush!? I talk to him, sing at him, carry him, wave toys at him!

Or do I just need to go thru a week of hell and hope that everything gets better after.

 

[CoreysMummy]

Anyone tried this and had it work/not work?

http://www.askbaby.com/Baby-sleep-training.htm

 

[Sherlock]

Around 5 months is when he'll actually start to miss it if it goes. So losing it now would be a good time.

We are winding down Galen's use of one quite dramatically atm. And it'll be gone in the next couple of weeks totally.

He's more or less doing without it unless comfort sucking for ages or really tired and whiney. But then after a few minutes its not needed and spat out.

What we are doing in place of it is letting him have a muslin square to hold in his hands. For some reason he loves to have something to hold and a muslin is his preferred thing atm. Sometimes due to teething he shoves it and his fingers in his mouth and chews. He's been find doing this and we make sure we keep an eye on him.

At night tbh we don't use the dummy anymore at all. He may grizzle for 5 minutes or thrash around a bit but he tends to settle well if given time. If he stirs in the night we simply give him time to settle back down again before we go turn the mobile on in the background. He has learnt to fall asleep to it really easily and if its needed its usually enough to get him back to sleep. More often than not we don't need to use it though.

We use teething rings atm which he loves. Also distraction is always good. He only uses it a few times a day now.

FWIW chances are it won't be a week of hell if you ditch it. He won't really remember it and within about 24 -48 hours he'll have settled. I'd be inclined to once he wakes in the morning to take it away and then get through the day without it, before trying a night without it.

 

[daftscotslass]

Becky kind of dropped it herself. We were given a soft comforter thing that she now touches and gums on until she sleeps - she tends to chew for comfort now more than anything. We still have the dummies but have probably used them about 3 times in the last month or so and that was only because she had been woken up suddenly for a nap. If you want to try and ease him off it perhaps just use it for naps/night sleep to start with rather than whinging in the day?

He sounds like he's at the stage where he could use his hand for comfort all the time but is just on the edge of realising he can put it in his mouth and soothe himself. It's totally up to you if you want to continue using it - my nephew had one for naps for 2 and a half years and gave it up without fuss when he finally bit through the last one they had and his mum told him they weren't going to buy any more! It's not a sure thing that they will become "addicted".

Bear in mind it could also be the evil 4 month growth spurt causing him to wake up more often and unfortunately, dummy or no dummy, they can be unsettled at night no matter what.

 

[Sylvie]

Louis has dropped his by himself when he was almost 3 months old... that's when he started sucking his thumb instead. I was very pleased when he didn't want the dummy any more because he could be a nightmare when he was dropping it... that's why I never gave it to him at night, only in the early hours of the morning when he was still waking up around 5 a.m.

 

[loz]

Emms definately didnt want hers after about 3 months - she started sucking her thumb and fingers. I did get a teething dummy - they have a kind of arc shaped rubber bit which they can kind of chew on. Emms quite likes hers sometimes. I found that she was just chewing her other dummy not sucking it!

He might not need a dummy at all now and settle himself during the night?

 

[Bee]

Finlay ditched his on his own about 2/3 months - he now sucks his whole fist at times but normally his thumb