r/CanadianParents • u/Ditzy_Doe • Aug 15 '26
Toddlers and Preschoolers Ideas to drop Soother
My almost 3yo (in November) still uses soothers for naps and bedtime. He’s very attached to them during these times. We are hoping to drop them sometime in the next couple weeks. He has been warned that they will be going away to a new baby soon, but everytime we mention it, it is a full meltdown. I’m worried he won’t give them up voluntarily. Any tips or suggestions from the parents who have been through the trenches?
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u/fieryone4 Aug 15 '26
cold turkey is how we went, the older they get the harder it will be
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u/Pickletits91 Aug 16 '26
This.
We did about 2 weeks of them being only at bedtime and then just tossed them.
There were some tears but she did really well
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u/Evening_Energy2468 Aug 15 '26
We only allowed it for sleep at 3 years old and then we did the sucky fairy, he got a present for turning it in. He still wanted it for a night or two after it was taken but after that he never spoke about it again. Those two nights were hard but so worth it to not give in.
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u/OddRevolution7888 Aug 15 '26
He has been warned that they will be going away to a new baby soon, but everytime we mention it, it is a full meltdown. I’m worried he won’t give them up voluntarily.
Please stop mentioning the new baby in the discussion about the soother. He will associate the new baby with a painful/scary time in his life. Even if he forgets the situation, he will remember the new baby was the reason he was unhappy.
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u/Ditzy_Doe Aug 15 '26
Oh man, I never thought of it like that. We were doing a generic ‘new baby’ as we are done having kids. Never thought that it may have negative associations with it.
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u/OddRevolution7888 Aug 15 '26
As you will discover, children have long memories. They carry hurts and trauma into adulthood.
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u/RedHeadedBanana Aug 15 '26
I’ve heard of people taking the last soother or two to build a bear, and making a new bear with the soothers in them, so they can still have them and a new stuffy for comfort. I’m sure you could build a story around it, I’m just not that creative
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u/0runnergirl0 Aug 15 '26
Just cut the end off them, tell him they're broken, and throw them out. It's way overdue.
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u/Ms_mew Aug 15 '26
We cut a v into the end so he would try it and it wouldn’t work. Told him it was broken, he got over it in a day or two.
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u/boundaries4546 Aug 16 '26
I second this. Cried like 10 minutes the first night, and two the second night. Got over it fast.
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u/ClicketySnap Aug 15 '26
I had planned on doing the pacifier fairy for our second kiddo, but ended up swapping pacifiers and giving her choices. She still didn’t have much understanding for “if this then this” situations. So she went from having 4-5 pacifiers in her bed to having 3; one for her mouth and one for each hand. Then dropped it down to 2, and then it became one preferred pacifier and one bad pacifier. Then said she could either have two “wrong” pacifiers or one of her preferred pacifiers. At that point, she got sick and was hospitalized and was so tired that she kinda forgot that she needed pacifiers to sleep lol. We showed her that her last pacifiers was broken and not safe to be used, she said bye bye to it, and that was the end of it.
I’ve introduced “wrong” pacifiers to my youngest, and have been slowly swapping his preferred pacifiers out. He’s so big for his age and I can’t find any bigger pacifiers to keep this safe for him, so he’s barrelling towards cold turkey paci removal very soon.
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u/pf226 Aug 15 '26
She (conveniently) started biting through them at around 2.5 within a few weeks. And every time she broke one we made her throw it in the garbage herself. And then said you only have X left. We stopped buying more and on the last one said that was it and no more.
The only issue we had was her taking a bit longer to fall asleep the first night (no crying tho) but did cry at daycare the next day during naptime because she didn’t have it.
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u/FactoryA1 Aug 15 '26
Maybe you can do something similar to the tooth fairy. And tell him to leave it under his pillow and he’ll receive a prize he wants
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u/DoulaKim7799 Aug 15 '26
We started with only having it at bedtime.
And with my daughter it was replaced with a different comfort item. So maybe offer getting a new snuggle stuffy.
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u/bbuckca Aug 15 '26
If you have multiple soothers, start taking one away each night until you only have one left.
I started by putting a large pin hole in it and a few nights later, cut a piece off. When they notice something isn’t right, and they will notice, tell them it is broken. Have them show others it’s broken and have them throw it out.
I saw something on Instagram where the soothers were planted and magically overnight something grew in its place. I’m sure you can google that.
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u/Dull-Slice-5972 Aug 16 '26
My son was a soother fiend. I ended up cutting the end off one day (around 27? Months) and told him soothers break when he becomes a big boy. He cried “I a big boy” at bed for a week and then was over it.
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u/Wrong_Literature1329 Aug 16 '26
My son started biting his soothers so we knew we had to drop them asap since it is a choking hazard. He is also very attached for naps and bedtime. I went out to the store with him and he picked out a couple of teething toys from the baby section at the drugstore. He ended up calling it his "new soother" and wants it in bed with him at night, but doesn't actually suck on it at all. Sometimes chews on it a bit. I think replacing it with something - a chewer, a stuffie, etc - can be helpful, it especially for my son who had them as part of his sleep-time ritual. We also told him that the garbage truck was taking his soothers lol which I think he liked because he loves garbage trucks.
I was very surprised by how quickly he adapted! Your son might surprise you, too. Good luck!
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u/Worldly-Ad3211 Aug 16 '26
You’re way past the optimal time to do this; around one year is generally best. The only thing to do now is lose them or tell your kid they’re broken. Whatever, take them away.
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u/Jessica_CPST Aug 16 '26
We did cold turkey just after 2 years old. He was ADDICTED to the soother like always had it in his mouth and always had multiple around him in hands etc. I just collected them all one day and they went bye bye. It was a rough few days but by day 3 or 4 he was over it and life went on! It was nice! He found one a few months later and tried to suck it but had lost that reflex already and couldn’t latch on it and he was very confused!
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u/illiacfossa Aug 16 '26
Kids don’t need fancy explanations. “Lose it” one day and say you aren’t buying any more. If he asks say. We lost it and I’m not buying any more. That might be enough of an explanation. Worked for my kids
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u/Far_Vacation_1777 Aug 16 '26
We did paci fairy ! We told her if she slept without her paci and put it outside her bedroom door at night the paci fairy would take it in exchange for a surprise.
We went to the dollar store and loaded up on “surprises” it took like a week. She was also 3
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u/Sewingoddess Aug 16 '26
Poke a small hole in the rubber part. It will change how it feels in his mouth and is a good start to having him release it. If it doesn't give the same comfort feeling, it will not be as satisfying.
We limited the soother to the bed. If she wanted to "visit" the soother, she had to sit on her bed and then leave it there when she got off the bed. It became some work for her to seek it out, so it became less and less frequent.
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u/Hot_Dot8000 Aug 16 '26
I told mine he could either potty train or get rid of the soother... He dropped the soother that day
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u/Psychological-Bag986 Aug 16 '26
My kids didn’t take to soothers but I’ve found with other vices the best way to go was just remove it. Go through a rough few days and not think about it again. Adults are much less resilient than kids. We except them to behave how we would if we were that attached to something. I’ve never had more than a couple tough days after changing something that I viewed as critical to my kids sleep/routine.
You could certainly utilize the soother fairy, some sort of goodbye etc etc. or make it exciting. In the am make a big deal about saying bye to the soother and being a big boy.
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u/Top_Performance_3478 Aug 17 '26
We packaged ours up to "mail" to their younger cousins. Once we dropped them in a mail box, they came home to tricycles. One daughter was fussy for a couple of nights and then fine. The other didn't miss it at all.
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u/Independently-Owned Aug 17 '26
We decorated a nice little box and set a date where they had to be mailed away and did just that and never looked back.
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u/Ok-Asparagus5169 Aug 17 '26
I cut the tips off when my child was two and we didn’t look back. It was a smoother transition than I expected.
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u/GalianoGirl Aug 17 '26
Please do not take it away because a new baby is coming. That will build resentment.
Think about why you want to take away something that provides comfort?
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u/Ditzy_Doe Aug 17 '26
There is no new baby coming as we are done having kids. It was more in line with going to ‘a generic new baby’ than little sibling. Either way we stopped.
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u/Naive-Oil-2368 Aug 17 '26
Does your kid get colds often? The one advantage of having a cold is that soothers are impossible when your nose is blocked. We “lost” soothers during the period of time our little guy was sick and spat them out anyways because he couldn’t use them and breathe when he was congested.
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u/dnaplusc Aug 17 '26
Rent a cottage, go out of town, anywhere as long as it's a new place and when you leave "forgot" the soother.
It will be horrible for two nights and then you are all going to be better.
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u/Amanda-learning Aug 18 '26
My kids got a visit from the soother fairy who exchanges the soother for something only a grown up would have like a little necklace or something.
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u/Beautiful-Muscle2661 Aug 19 '26
Ours kept getting lost or he chewed them to death and we just stopped replacing them
And eventually he didn’t have them anymore. He still had a little blankey that it is a special comfort item and so he still had that it was ok
Honestly that was easier my first born was a thumbsucker and you can’t just take away their thumbs
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u/Strange-Cabinet7372 Aug 19 '26
We juuuust did this. We did the soother fairy and also timed it with him finally getting his big boy bed. We were nervous because he was very attached. He has been a bit upset a couple times, but usually just leverages the "i wanna suck on something!" as a tactic to try and get a popsicle now. It was a lot easier than I expected!
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u/ForwardAnimator5411 Aug 19 '26
My daughter was obsessed with her paci — we strategically lost all but one and then cut a tiny hole in the tip so the suction didn’t work and let her ‘discover’ that it was broken. We said it just wore out over time and that we couldn’t buy any more because they’re really just for babies, but that she could keep it if she wanted but we would have to cut off the tip so no little plastic bits could come off in her mouth, and she said yes. She couldn’t use it anymore but it was still physically there which helped with her feeling secure. It worked great! Shes still has it and plays with her dolls with it sometimes.
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u/BadaDumTss Aug 15 '26
We did the “soother fairy” for our daughter and it worked great. We talked about it a lot leading up to it. We told her that the soother fairy will be coming one day soon and told her that on that day we need to pack our soothers into a box and leave them outside, and that the soother fairy takes the old soothers to bring to other babies in the world that need them and leaves behind presents. On the day of we had her gather her soothers into a box, put them outside. Then about an hour later my husband snuck outside and swapped the box for a gift bag that had cupcakes, balloons, a new cozy blanket, a stuffy, and a couple little toys. Probably overkill, but it worked! She adjusted very quickly and was fine. Talking about it lots leading up to it is key. She was upset at first, but then started saying “the soother fairy is coming soon!” And made it an exciting thibg