My Pacifier, My Best Friend

I used to hate pacifiers. They looked really ugly to me, hanging out of children’s mouths. I mean, if they’re all bright and happy running around the mall, what kind of “pacifying” do they need? They don’t look like they need anything to “pacify” them.

To me, pacifiers should only be used to, strangely enough, pacify babies and very young children. When Abang was a baby, he was a very – how shall I put this – “highly spirited” and “high need” baby which I suppose is just a more polite way of saying he was fussy, cranky and cried a lot. He “needed” a lot of feeding, attention – generally a lot of contact hours. If I were his lecturer, he would have used up all the contact hours outside of lecture times, and would even have demanded extra tutorials. If I were a restaurant, he would have made sure I was Mom’s All Day & All Night Dining: Open 24 Hours.

So we tried the pacifier on him. Pfft – he spit it out and demanded the real thing instead. Ok, fine. We threw all the pacifiers out.

When Adik came along, I nursed him too. The problem with nursing is that it’s hard to predict when baby’s next feed will be as it’s not quite as predictable as bottle-feeding. A fair number of times we got caught with Adik suddenly wanting a feed in the middle of a journey. Not wanting to take him out of his car seat, we just distracted him as much as possible to stop or avoid the crying.

After several incidences, we decided to try the pacifier. Hey, he likes it! Excellent, no more crying jags in the car. However, as a rule, we only ever give Adik the pacifier when he’s sleepy or, for whatever reason, we don’t seem to be able to pacify him, i.e. he’s not hungry, not thirsty, not bored or over stimulated, etc. I’m fine with the pacifier as a sleeping aid and to pacify him, but if he’s not fussing, then no pacifier.

Unfortunately, he liked it a bit too much and by the time he was 4 months old he rejected the real thing. I was a bit disappointed, but looked on the bright side – this all day eatery is closed!

Initially, I was very particular – pacifier only to help him fall asleep. Once he’s asleep, pull the pacifier out. That lasted all of, oh, I think, about a month? After that, it was, “Oh, never mind, he seems to sleep better with it.” Which was true, and still is till today. He can now feel around the bed for it when he stirs in the middle of the night and put himself back to sleep using the pacifier without needing my help! Not all the time, of course, but most of the time, which is more than I can say for Abang.

The question now is: When should I start to wean myself of his pacifier? It’s so nice to be able to sleep through the night – yes, for Adik, too I'm sure – that I’m dreading the day I have to start weaning us both off his best sleep friend.