We knew it was coming. The time was drawing near and we could all feel it. We knew it would be hard. We knew it would be a battle. We had to be ready. We picked our day. We prepared ourselves. We planned and plotted and discussed until we felt we were ready. Finally the day had come. "P-Day" as we liked to call it. It was the end... of... THE PACIE.
We chose a Monday... seemed logical. We discussed it with Grace the entire previous week. She had agreed that in exchange for a HUGE dump truck she would give up the pacie EXCEPT at bed time. This seemed reasonable so all parties agreed. It was a rocky start but all-in-all it was easier than anticipated. She is several days in and doing awesome. She barely asks for it at all. I am so happy to see her beautiful face without that green thing in the way.
Like potty training we decided against a "cold turkey" mentality when it comes to these major milestones. I hear people say all the time with potty training and the pacie "you know you could just do it all at once and it would be easier than you think". I realize this is the prevailing notion with most milestones. That just doesn't work for us. With a child like Grace change is traumatic. EXTREMELY traumatic. She spends a great deal of time in OT working on things like transitions, schedule changes and the unexpected. So for her pulling the rug out from under her can be a catastrophe. So instead we let the girls tell us (not always verbally) when they are ready. It works for us.
Here is our homage to Grace and her pacie. It was a beautiful love affair. :D
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4 comments:
Go Gracie!!!!!!!!
Awww, those pictures are so sweet. =) How is she doing without it? I feel like we need to take it all together (from that last post about it) but like I said...when is the time to just take them completely? When do you plan on that?
C - We both felt like she was ready during the day to be without it. In terms of at night we figure we'll talk about it for a while and when she shows signs that she doesn't need it (which I figure will be in the next 6 months) we'll talk about it with her and pick a date. For us it is the balancing act between not stifling her speech or mouth growth AND giving her what she needs to soothe herself. It's a tough wire to walk for sure.
I think she's doing great. It seems the time is right for her.
We went cold turkey on the no bottles at bed (only bottle time left) last week. While it 'worked', I wish I had done it differently. It was hard on them and me too.
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