Beautiful Boy...

Xavier is officially a recovering BINKIholic. It's been three days and two nights now since his last suck. He has been an addict since birth and for a while we just thought it was a phase he would someday grow out of. All babies experiment with the use of a pacifier sometime in their life, right? So we tried not to make too much of it although it was obviously something we were all ashamed of. Rarely did we let him take it out in public and only once in a while could he have it in the car (on road trips to my mom's house only). We set goals and deadlines for him to be plug free. First it was age TWO, but then Deacon was born three days after his birthday and how were we supposed to explain that it was OK for the baby to have one, but not him? Then we thought we'd wait until he was out of his crib to stage the intervention, but we figured that moving into a bed was a crossroad in his life, and too many major changes could do serious damage long term. So age three became the new deadline....although I must admit that I NEVER thought I'd wait that long.

The other night we were really struggling to get him to stay in his bed. We were taking shifts taking him back to his room after he got out over and over. Finally at around midnight, we thought the coast was clear. I decided to take a long hot bath after feeling like I had just wrestled a wild animal for three hours. All of a sudden in the corner of my eye I see a small midgety figure lurking in the doorway of my bathroom. He had this defiant expression on his face combined with a smirk that just made me LOSE it. At the time I felt like I had no choice, but in retrospect I probably reacted a little strongly (what follows is NOT a Super Nanny approved technique). I grabbed the BINKY out of his mouth, took my hair cutting scissors from the bathroom drawer, and cut the top right off. We both stared down at the decapitated Mickey Mouse BINKS in shock. I tried to act like it wasn't a big deal, but he could see the panic in my face. He marched upstairs and told Q on me. "Daddy! Mommy scissored my BINKY!"

The following day there were so many questions. "Mom, where's my Binky? The blue Mickey Mouse one. I need it! Why you scissor my Binky? You throw it in the garbage?" All of these things were said in a very angry and hurt tone. When it came time to put him to bed we brushed his teeth, read books, said prayers and then he asked me the dreaded question..."Where's my BINKS?" I explained to him that big boys don't need BINKIES, and that at least he still had his blanket to snuggle with. He wasn't very satisfied with my answer, and I could tell that the detoxing wasn't going so well, so I tried distracting him by telling him my Grandma Turnbull's story "Gilnabby" (the extended version). By the end of the fifteen minute tale, he wasn't stirring and his breathing was steady. I thought I was in the clear so I began to carefully sneak out of his bed. All of a sudden his chubby little hands were cupping my face. In his adorable high pitch voice he pleaded with me. "Mommy, listen to me. Listen to ME!" His face was SO serious as he stated one last time...."I want a new BINKY". With that, he closed his eyes and as he drifted off to sleep he whispered to no one in particular, "I so sad!"

Please remember Xavier in your thoughts and prayers as he goes through this difficult time.