Dummies

[The Tiggster]

My 11 week old boy has dropped his midlle of the night feed & is effectively sleeping through the night (yeah!) except he has a dummy which I fear he is dependant on. I hated the thought of dummies prior to his arrival, but his first 5 days & nights produced no sleep, as he wanted to suckle all the time even if he was fed sucessfullly. My Midwife suggested because he was a sucky baby, a dummy & it did the trick.

Our problem now is he uses it to go to sleep (is very rarely given it at other times) but it falls out & he gets fretful when he notices it's not there. The past couple of nights he has had it replaced up to 20 times so in effect his sleeping though the night is of no benefit to us!

Has anyone weaned such a young baby off a dummy & if so how? He is not able to sooth himself any other way (gets lots of cuddles/soothing from us & is swaddled to sleep) and was almost vomiting from distress without it. I fear we will never be able to put him into his own room in a few months as we will be stuck at the side of the cot popping it back in.

Any help/advice is greatly appreciated.

[tigilou]

I remember this. He at the moment cant see or move to find it so is dependant on you putting it there, there hands move to their mouth and fling it out, they drop it when they are sleeping etc but it does get better promise he will soon realise its in there and practice taking it out of his mouth and putting it back in i think my daughter was 3 to 4 months cant quite remember. He will learn to pick it up and put it in soon in the night again i use to send my daughter up with 3 or 4 so if one fell through the cot side she would find another one. It will happen and the string things you can get toclip on to his pjs are great but i wood wait till he is a bit more older. Not sure if i helped but good luck and i fully sympathise with you been there done that sort of thing but it will be funny when you see him trying to line his mouth up with his hand to get it in. Good luck

[The Tiggster]

Thank you tigilou, I know it will get better. We are so pleased that he is not needing a feed in the wee small hours, but gutted that the bloomin' dummy is keeping us all awake!

We are laughing about it though, maybe not at the time!

[tigilou]

Ahh bless him i know its terrible isnt with one eye open digging about in the middle of the night lol my daughter is 2 and has just gone through the night i know all about the one eyed mole take care

[sunflower68]

The Tiggster I felt exactly the same when my eldest took to a dummy. However it gave me such sanity and REST that when my youngest was born I admit I forced one upon her! She didn't take to it as much as he; both were easily weaned off in the toddler stage. I only used them for sleeping and had no adverse probs. They do lose them in the night; you can buy clips which are brilliant. The babes are lying on their backs anyway so it doesn't harm to clip them to their little babygros. Don't forget you too need as much sleep as you can get. If I can give you any advice it is just to keep the dummy for sleeping-time. Good luck!

[sunflower68]

Soz!! Just re read your thread; did not mean an 11-week old will be able to put the dummy back. Don't know if I have been much help at all...will get me coat...

[DavidUK]

We had exactly the same problem with our first child. He was a terrible sleeper and at least the dummy gave some help but, as with your baby, he kept waking up when the dummy dropped out. Consequently, for our second child, my wife insisted that we didn't give him a dummy. That worked out OK except that he is 7 now and sucks his thumb all the time, which isn't good.

In your case, it may be best not to be in any hurry to get him off the dummy. I sympathise with the sleepless nights - it's horrible. It does come to an end eventually though! Good luck.

[bohochick]

Hi Tiggster, i wouldn't worry too much about the use of a dummy, did you see the news recently that said dummy's were actually good for babies as it helped prevent cot deaths! i think this was by keeping the airway open or something like that. my 1 year old still has hers at bed times and i think there are far worse things she could be having! good luck it will pass soon and you'll look back and laugh and start planning another baby ha ha

[mw]

i too was against dummies but they turned out to be a life saver for giving us some peace and quiet.

I used to put my son to bed with 4 or 5 dummies so if it fell out he would feel another eventually and fall asleep. Once he is a bit older and can manage to grasp better and put it in his mouth i think he will settle.

My son used to have one in each hand and 2 in his mouth and he was off them about 3/4 and he is now 11..lol

[The Tiggster]

Thank you everyone for your feedback & positive messages. I think we will just stick with it just now & not try to upset his routine too much. I spoke to my health worker today & she says he's just in the habit of waking & he'll probably grow out of it now that he's not hungry through the night.

Good news is today he has only looked for his dummy when needing a sleep as his hands & toys are interesting him a lot more! I did take the dummy out when he was asleep this morning & the little lamb was still sucking as if it was there for ages!

Thanks again.

Tiggs

[kazminx]

hiya, i never did get the worry about dummies, who cares!!! mine both had dummies til they were about 4!! so what...the trick is to put about half a dozen in the cot and they will feel about til they find one. if you are gonna pop it in every time, they wont learn to fiddle for one. By the way, both my kids have fantastic teeth!

[sunny30]

Hi, i am the same, my 12 week old son, slept all night as from last week, and thanks to the dummie...i am so or was so against them, but he needed it. But its the dummie falling out that keeps us awake to....i have said i am going to get sticky sided tape and tape it to his cheeks, ha ha.
My health visitor said get them off before 8 months or otherwise leave it untill they are 2.
I am not worrying about that just yet, if he is happy on iy so am i.
good luck

[The Tiggster]

Hi Sunny, my baby is now 9 months old & I am pleased to say that he was off his dummy by the time he was 4 months. At this time he found his fingers and was able to suck on them, so we went cold turkey with the dummy and all we had was 1 bad night were he wanted it, but after that he was fine.

If we have another baby I would have no fear about giving a dummy if he/she needed it as I know you can now get them off it before too late a date.

Good luck with your youngster.

[sunny30]

Hi , me boy has found his hands and fingers now too, he is only really on hisdummie at bed time, I dont know why i didnt get one the first time around, i had a screaming baby all day and night and all i had to do was pop down to the chemist, i would not think twice about a dummie if i have more. Hope you and your baby are doing well.
x