How We Ditched The Dummy - Finally!

I’ve been meaning to write this post for a while now, It’s very overdue.

We FINALLY ditched the DoDo!! (well actually we did it quite a while ago, I am just rather behind in posting our achievement).

Emmy was very attached to her dummy – I mean really attached, definitely our fault as for ease it was clipped to her. This saved us the hassle of having to go into her room several times a night to retrieve the lost dummy, and saved having to keep picking it up off the floor, as we kept having to do when she was young.

Emmy’s Dummy got the name ‘DoDo’ as when she was very young and not talking, she would do a fish impression whenever she wanted her dummy – this was cute for a few weeks then it got annoying, so we needed a name for it, something she would easily learn to say. DoDo was my idea as it would soon become extinct (or so I hoped – Emmy had other ideas).

I then planned to remove hers when Harry came alone – This backfired when she kept stealing his, and I realised this was not the correct time.

Time past and the longer it was left the harder it became.

I then tried again at Christmas, we left them in a box for Father Christmas to take away, along with a note. She was keen on this until bedtime and she became hysterical – she didn’t want father Christmas to come, she didn’t want presents, she didn’t want Christmas.

Maybe the festive happy period wasn’t the correct time for us either.

Just after her birthday I introduced the idea of a DoDo fairy.

We put in a fairy door when we decorated her bedroom.

We started talking about the fairies daily, she would sit on her bedroom floor talking through the door to the fairies too – it was very cute. We discussed that the fairies needed the DoDo’s for the babies.

Slowly I started to get rid of the huge haul she had accumulated over the years. If the DoDo was on the floor it want into a bin.

I did this slowly over a number of weeks – maybe 2/3 disappeared a week (She had accumulated around 20 and hidden them all over the house).
If Emmy mentioned them (she knew where she had hidden them), she was told the fairies were collecting them.

When we were down to the last 4, I used sterilised scissors to create a hole in the side of one Dummy. This hole although only small meant they didn’t work properly anymore.
Emmy then chose herself to pop these in the bin!

She did this slowly and I would wait until she chose to do it herself.

It was then her decision.

She knew I wasn’t buying any more.

She knew there weren’t many left.

When one went, I then cut a small slit into the next (without her seeing). Within the week we were Dummy-less!

She had chosen to put them in the bin.

She talked of the fairies having the others for the babies, but these were broken so they didn’t want those.

It was actually very pain-free as we did it together, when she was ready, at a pace which suited us both.

Yes, she had a dummy longer than I planned, longer than she should have, however we had no sleepless nights, no tears and she wasn’t upset at all when the last one went.

I’m very proud of Emmy for finally giving up the only comforter she has ever had – she has never bonded with a special teddy so it was hard for her.

She has been Dummy free for over 4 months now. Well done Emmy!

I will try to part Harry with his earlier than we did with Emmy however I will wait until he is a bit older to understand.