The Great Pacifier Debate: Will You or Won’t You?
Yes, he used a pacifier…until very recently.
When I was expecting my first baby, I bought a couple pacifiers. I thought I’d offer them to her if she wanted them. After all, I had them growing up, so why not!
Well, she used them sometimes in the first two months of her life, but pretty soon after I stopped pumping and got her exclusively nursing, she didn’t want anything more to do with them.
Which then led me to say that we were not going to offer them to my son. At all. Not even going there, because they were bad and unnecessary and I should be able to satisfy all his needs myself, with nursing.
(Don’t laugh.) That’s not how it worked out, though….
Yes, I know, ideally, all babies would be exclusively breastfed (which my son was — no bottles) and they would do all their sucking, comfort or feeding, from mom. I know, I know.
But then what do you do with a baby who latches on, sucks for two seconds, and immediately unlatches and screams because he doesn’t want more milk…he just wants to suck! That was my son, completely. And so by the time he was a week old, he had a pacifier in his mouth whenever he was asleep. I wrote about some our experiences with pacifiers on my blog.
This continued…and he was 18 months and still sucking that thing all the time. Well, whenever he was tired or upset, anyway. We had tried to wean him off it around 6 months, when we were also trying to teach him to self-soothe and sleep through the night…neither of which happened at.all, and then he got a bad cold anyway and it all went out the window. Oh well…
Anyway, he finally gave it up over the weekend. We took it away in the morning (intending to allow him to have it back for sleep), but then he fell asleep at nap without it. So we didn’t give it to him for bed. He asked, but didn’t seem very unhappy when we said no. Since then he asks less and less (only when very tired/upset but sometimes not even then). My only regret is he doesn’t like to snuggle me as much before bed now. 
I guess my baby’s growing up! He’s still shy of 2, so I feel like…well, it’s gone now. Good enough.
It may have helped that neither of my babies ever had “nipple confusion.” They did not care what they took — breast, bottle, or pacifier — as long as they got to suck on something. I’m sure if it had been an issue, I would have felt differently.
So this baby? I’ll have some around. I’ll try not to use them, attempting to satisfy him/her first via breastfeeding. But if I have to…I have to. Depends on how “sucky” the baby is. I don’t mind admitting that I might not use them in a ‘perfect’ world, but this isn’t one. I may try to limit this one more, but that, too, depends on what I can feasibly do. If the baby likes them and it buys me five minutes to finish serving the older kids lunch…so be it. You know? I have to be realistic.
What do you think? Will you offer your baby a pacifier or not?
I feel exactly the same way!!
Yes for sure!
I was totally against the binky when my daughter was born but the nurse in the hospital gave her one anyway. She was cholicy and had reflux and i guess they didnt want to hear her crying for the 30 seconds they had her in the nursery. I couldnt get her to give it up when we came home and now she just turned 4. I’ve had no luck getting the binky away from her and i’ve tried everything! I mean everything! She will give it up in the morning but in the afternoon if she takes a nap or at bedtime she cries till shes sick if i dont give it to her! To make a very long story short i do not plan on giving my new baby one unless its 100% needed.
I had them with my daughter (who is now 4, going on 20), but she was like yours, used them a little, but then didn’t want them till she was teething, and that was only to gum on them. With my son (2mo) my husband and I were very much “no pacifier” because my DH kept going on about how gross they get, etc. That lasted until baby got here. Now we keep ‘the plug’ as it has been affectionately named by my Grandmother, fairly handy. Just to calm him down, because he likes to use Mommy as a pacifier. Thats fine at night, but during the day, I have more need of my hands. Just goes to show you that all babies are different.
We held out for 3 months. Our daughter would nurse so much and constantly sucked her fist and screamed in frustration. Finally i gave her a pacifier and she looked up at me calmly as though to thank me.
What about the whole plastic issue? Are there any “safe” pacifiers?
They make pacifiers that are all silicone
Both of my kids were breastfed and were given soothies when they needed them. At about 4 months they both discovered it was more fun to gum them than suck. OUT they went.
For Jessica, the mom w/the 4 yo who still has it. There is a very easy fix. Take it away and let her cry. Giving into fits over something like this isn’t being a parent. She knows if she screams she’ll get what she wants. She’s manipulating you!
Set a date, mark it on the calendar and that’s that. Have her give them to a new baby who needs them more. Have her put them in a bag and when she’s asleep, throw it away. She’ll think she’s being generous and you’ll be rid of all the paci’s. There will probably be tears for a few days, but in a week or less she’ll have forgotten about them.
I don’t understand the desire to NOT allow your baby to have one. Really, what’s it hurting?? I don’t get it. I BF both of my babies, but the also both had bottles and paci’s within a week of birth (paci’s were right away though) and never had any nipple confusion. They NEEDED the sucking motion, very obviously. As they got older, they only had it for naps and bedtime, and around 15 months we just stopped. My daughter is only 2 now, and I can’t even remember if taking it away was an issue for her, so I’m assuming it was a non-issue. If they don’t need it and don’t find comfort in it, great, but denying them that comfort just seems plain mean.
Listen Nona…..you aren’t there to hear the screaming. My son is exactly the same as Jessica’s daughter. We tried all the things you say work so easy. The screaming he does for the paci is not the same as the scream for more toys or some other unnecessary thing. It is a painful cry of desperation. He needs the sucking to soothe. The dentist wasn’t too worried, and he talks just fine thank you very much. You raise your kids to be perfect, and I’ll raise mine to be happy.
As someone who sucked my fingers until I was in high school, I am going to try really hard to get my baby on a pacifier so that weaning is easier. I am very lucky in that my crooked teeth aren’t really that bad and it’s more of an overbite that’s not too noticeable.
I’m all for them. As much as I wanted to breastfeed before having my son, when I actually had him I didn’t like breastfeeding at all for various reasons. One of those reasons was that I was being used as a pacifier and greatly resented it. Every time he cried, he would be brought to me to sooth but he cried all the time, he was very colicky. This was one of the things I changed to enable myself to keep breastfeeding. I thought I would be against them at first but for my sanity I gladly used them and I went on to breastfeed for 5 months.
Sofia is 2mos. and she occasionally wants a pacifier. What’s interesting, is that she has a bit of a latch problem so the lactation consultant was the one who recommended a pacifier to help her learn how to suck more vigorously. I notice now that when she’s been using it, her latch improves. Kind of the opposite of what I’ve been told regarding their effects on breast feeding.
I think the longer you wait to take it away, the harder it will be on the kids….
When my son was born I had already decided no binky cuz I worried about the whole “nipple confusion” thing. He really did enjoy sucking on our little fingers, though, when he was fussy but wasn’t busy nursing. He was the only one in his playgroup who didn’t use a pacifier. After several months I figured the nipple confusion thing would be a non-issue since he was a breast nipple expert by then. I bought him some silicone pacifiers. He either played with them or wanted nothing to do with them. Looking back, though, I’m totally fine with him not becoming attached to a pacifier. What we end up doing with baby #2 remains to be seen…
I was all for the binky. My son had his just until his first tooth came in. I noticed him chewing on one and threw them all away. It wasn’t a big deal, and he got teething toys during the day instead. My daughter, on the other hand, absolutely refused one. She found her thumb within the first few months and thumb-sucking is still going strong at almost 3 years old. We’ve been trying to help her break the habit, but I agree that the older the child is, the harder it is to stop.
My son is now almost 11 months and hasn’t used one since he was about 4 months, and even then, it was sporadically. I certainy wasn’t against it – he just never really took to it.
I know that I didn’t have the pacifier very long…and ended up sucking my thumb until age 6 or so. I eventually gave it up myself, and never had any problems with my teeth, in fact, never had braces or retainers or anything. It was a comfort thing.
Did and would again. It was gone by age 1. In fact, we took it on an airplane trip when he was 18 months, and he refused it. It was definitely a suckling aid for my little man, no more, no less. And, I have not once heard someone say that all of baby’s sucking should be on mom. In fact, I heard quite the opposite. It can be really trying to breastfeed as it is, without the added stress of having a suckling baby on you 24/7. And I live in the land of the hippies, so I would think I’d have run across this at some point. Get a binkie, and let yourself off the damn hook.
I didn’t want my first to have one, but after 6 weeks of major comfort nursing and him wanting to nurse all.night.long I gave in–he used one in bed and in the car (otherwise he screamed and screamed), and I was able to sleep a little.
We took it around 9 months because he was waking a gazillion times a night looking for it, and about a month later he started sucking his thumb! He is 3.5 and still sucks it.
With the second baby, he wouldn’t comfort suck at the breast, so we gave him a binky on day 2 or 3. He is still quite attached to it now (just turned one) but he sleeps well, so I don’t care.