This post is being written a bit late, but it certainly is a big milestone in Zoe’s life, so I’m writing it now.

We had our yearly vacation in Carlsbad, CA from June 21st through July 5th of this year. It was great, two weeks on the beach, a welcome resbite from the daily grind every year. This year, however, something loomed over my head for the last week or so; Zoe giving up the binkies.

Mommy had been prepping her for several months because she had a plan to ditch the little plastic and silicone comfort plugs at the end of vacation. Mommy had been telling her that she was going to be burying the binkies on the beach for the baby sand crabs. Every couple of days or so during the time leading up to our trip, Mommy would remind Zoe that we were leaving the binks on the beach.

So the day finally came. It was Saturday morning and we were checking out of the room. Mommy had saved a clear plastic container that we had all the binks (save the 3 emergency binks i stowed away in my pocket) in the jug ready for thier demise.

We all three headed down to the beach. I used a little green shovel to dig up a suitable hole near the sea wall as mommy and Zoe stood by watching. We put the jug in the hole and had a little going a way ceremony. We told Zoe to say good bye to the binks and she got down on her knees, bent forward, kissed the plastic jug and said “bye bye binkies.” I was fighting back the tears. She was being such a strong little girl.

We walked back up the stairs, checked out and were gone. The trip back was not too bad (6 hours) until after we stopped in Yuma for food. After we ate and hit the road again, Zoe started to get cranky and wanted to sleep. She asked repeatedly for the binkies but we denied them to her. She fussed but finally fell asleep with about 45 minutes to go in the trip home. This proved to be HORRIBLE timing.

When we arrived home, Zoe woke up. She usually sleeps for about 2 hours so the 45 minutes was not good for her. It weas also almost 5:00, so it was kinda late for her to be napping. Of course, the first thing she asked for when she awoke was her binkie. The whiny tone soon turned into a detoxing crackhead’s fit of agony and discomfort. She was pissed!

I can’t event describe how brutal her screams of agony were. She screamed and cried for about an hour before finally calming down. Mommy and I tired to take turns laying with her but I was having a tough go at it. Here she is screaming for a bink and her one source of unrelenting comfort, me, not being able to comfort her. I told Kris that I was going to give her one, and she replied “Go ahead, but the next time we have to take the binks away, you will do it without any help from me!” That quickly stopped my irrational thought.

Anyway, she made it through that first night in detox and got better in a matter of days. Luckily, I was out of town the first week. She hasn’t asked for them since and has been doing great!

We kept reminding her that she is a big girl and big girls don’t have binks! Its funny because when we tell her that she is going to do something and say “big girls do such and such”, and she doesnt want to do it, she’ll whine and say, “I’m not a big girl”

Yes, she is.

Categories: Milestones
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