Passy Sick.

Their History:

When Annie was born, Steven & I hadn't quite decided whether or not we wanted to let her have a pacifier.  However, since she was in the NICU and got upset very easily, the nursery staff gave her one to help keep her calm (which it did) while we were not around.  She needed this source of comfort since at the time I wasn't able to hold or nurse her yet... so we were ok with the decision.  Annie and her Passy are first loves.  She loved her passy even before she loved me.  Her passy has been a crucial part of her existence for the past 2 years and has helped her sleep every night since she was born.  When she was 16-18 months we restricted her passy use to only nap/bedtime.  When she wakes up she has to put them in this bin that sits on top of her toy shelf.  She's not allowed to walk around with them.  She loves her passy so much that she will sometimes ask to go to bed early just so she can spend more time with her passy.  It's a sweet relationship.

What We Did:

Annie is 2, which means its time to get rid of passy.  We decided to do the breaking while Steven was off in anticipation that she would have a very hard first few days without it.  She really really loves this thing and so I knew it would be hard for her to part with it.  It's almost the equivalent of making her throw her beloved blanket away.  When she woke up yesterday morning Steven snuck her passys out and snipped the tops.  Our plan was to let her walk around with her passy all day so that she could see that it was broken...instead of thinking that we were just hiding them from her.  

Day 1 Events:

Annie was super upset when she saw that her passy was broken.  We had to show her the bin that she stores them in so she could see that they were all broken (we snipped two and threw the rest away).  She was devastated.  We sat her in her chair while we got her breakfast ready and she cried and cried.  We sympathized with her and said things like, "Oh no Annie! What happened?!  Your passy is broken! I'm sorry!"  She kept trying to give them to her daddy so that he could fix them.  After realizing that he couldn't, she asked him to throw one of them in the trash, but she wanted to hold on to the last one she had. 

Annie had a bit of a fever yesterday so I got her thermometer out to check her temp.  After doing so I left the thermometer on the table and she kept putting it in passy's hole and checking passy's temp.  She'd say "Oh poor poor passy.  passy sick.  passy sick mama."  (took everything Steven and i had not to die laughing).  She then proceeded to give her passy a hug and kiss and she kept rocking it saying "shhhh.  shhhh.  its ok passy."  Break. My. Heart.  Once breakfast was over she was more ok with her broken passy, but she still wanted to hold and comfort it.

All morning we let her walk around with it and she played with it and let it go down her race car track and she pushed it around in the stroller.  Quite the little mama she is.  At nap time I took her to bed and let her hold her broken passy.  She kept asking me for another one and I showed her that her bin was empty and that her only passy was broken.  She wasn't too sure about this, but she accepted it and didn't cry when I walked out of her room.  I anticipated nap time going TERRIBLY.  I seriously expected an all out fit/meltdown over not having one to the point that I'd need to put her in bed with me to comfort her.  That's not what happened at all.  She did get out of her bed a few times to go peek in the bin (which i sat on the floor so she could see)...and then she'd crawl back in bed.  She'd put her passy in her mouth and take it out, in and out...then she'd flop over.  This went on for a good 10 minutes before she finally fell asleep.  She whined a few times but there was no crying.  NONE.  I could not believe it.  She slept for 2 hours.

She was a little heartbroken when she woke up, once again seeing that her passy was still broken (and she had another fever) - but she got over it really quickly and spent her afternoon playing with her broken passy.  Again, she would rock and comfort it every now again.  Then she'd perk up and say, "Passy broken!  Wont work!"  At one point she even threw it away in the bathroom trash!!!  I said "Oh good girl Annie.  Are you throwing your passy away?"  her answer "NOPE!!!!"  and she dug it out.  (thankfully I had just emptied the trash).

At bedtime the same scenario as nap time occured.  She kept trying it and it wouldn't work... so she read a few books and fell asleep after about 15 minutes all by herself.  She slept all night and didn't wake up crying a single time.  Again, we expected her to wake up a million times and were prepared for her to end up in bed with us.  But she didn't do that.  

Conclusion:

Even though she felt bad yesterday, she still handled the broken passy like a champ.  I am SO incredibly proud of how well she did.  I really did expect a full meltdown and that never happened.  She isn't quite ready to let her broken passy go yet... she's likes to hold it and "play with it"....but it doesn't work anymore and she doesn't use it, so we are ok with that for now.  Maybe in a few days she will be ready to part with it.