Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #308 How Do We Ditch the Dummy?

Transcript

#308 How Do We Ditch the Dummy? · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

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  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the
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  Speaker 1: time poor parent who just wants answers.
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  Speaker 2: Now, as parents, we need to become a little bit
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  Speaker 2: more comfortable with our children being uncomfortable, not that we're
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  Speaker 2: supposed to be making them suffer when it's time for
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  Speaker 2: the child to get off the dummy. If you've made
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  Speaker 2: the decision, then stick with it.
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  Speaker 1: And now here's the stars of our show, my mum
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  Speaker 1: and dad.
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  Speaker 2: We are back from holidays, not that we went anywhere
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  Speaker 2: thanks to lockdowns and all that sort of stuff.
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  Speaker 3: That really put it down from.
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  Speaker 2: Me and it rained that put another damper on things
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  Speaker 2: went to holidays. I hope they're better next year than
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  Speaker 2: they were this year. We'll talk more about our I'll
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  Speaker 2: do better tomorrow on Friday with the holidays. Hi, my
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  Speaker 2: name is Justin here with Kylie. We parents of six kids.
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  Speaker 2: I've written a bunch of books about happy families and
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  Speaker 2: run the website happy families dot com. Do I hey, Kylie,
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  Speaker 2: yesterday that was a fun podcast. Did you enjoy what
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  Speaker 2: we did yesterday?
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  Speaker 3: When I told the kids that we were actually going
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  Speaker 3: to be interviewed by Cameron and Ellie Daddo, they had
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  Speaker 3: no idea who they were, until I reminded them that
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  Speaker 3: we'd actually seen Cameron at the Capitol Theater a few
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  Speaker 3: years ago. He was playing Captain von.
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  Speaker 2: Troup in I was going to say Mary Poppins, but
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  Speaker 2: its noun of mus I remember, yeah, yeah, yeah. Whilsting
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  Speaker 2: around the stage.
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  Speaker 3: It was so funny because our ten year old, her
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  Speaker 3: whole face lit up and she said, oh, he was
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  Speaker 3: really cute.
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  Speaker 2: That was the first thing she said. He's in his fifties.
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  Speaker 2: What are you saying? Oh?
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  Speaker 4: That's when the fourteen year old kind of.
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  Speaker 2: Looked at us and went, that is gross.
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  Speaker 3: He must be at least fifty.
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  Speaker 2: Mom, it's got gray hair and a beard. And the
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  Speaker 2: ten year old saying, oh, look, he looks very distinguished.
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  Speaker 2: But I'm surprised my ten year old finds him. But
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  Speaker 2: maybe she was, Maybe she was looking for another word,
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  Speaker 2: and cute was the only one that came out. I
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  Speaker 2: know that when he was a kid, when he was
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  Speaker 2: a TV star, when we were kids growing up, because
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  Speaker 2: he's kind of got a half a dozen or so,
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  Speaker 2: maybe ten years on you and a few less on me,
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  Speaker 2: but he was this icon. I mean, everyone knew who
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  Speaker 2: Cameron Dadda was and he married Alison Bree like she
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  Speaker 2: was going to be this supermodel and she gave it
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  Speaker 2: all up so that she could be married and be
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  Speaker 2: a mum, which I think is nowadays it goes against
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  Speaker 2: the grain. Yeah, even more so now, but even then
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  Speaker 2: in the nineteen eighties, it was a really, really big deal.
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  Speaker 2: So if you missed the conversation that we had with
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  Speaker 2: Cameron and Ali Daddo in their bathroom, we replayed a
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  Speaker 2: podcast that they have on well, I was an episode
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  Speaker 2: of their podcast called Separate Bathrooms, and you can catch
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  Speaker 2: it on their podcast called Separate Bathrooms, or you can
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  Speaker 2: just listen to it in our Feet from yesterday. I
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  Speaker 2: really liked the conversation. I just well, that's because I
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  Speaker 2: got to talk about how good you are. So let's
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  Speaker 2: find out how good you are as a mum. It's
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  Speaker 2: been a while, but listener questions every Tuesday. We try
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  Speaker 2: to use our experience, your experience as a mum, and
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  Speaker 2: my experience as a parenting expert to answer your questions
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  Speaker 2: and help your family be happier. This one deals with
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  Speaker 2: something that we have never in our entire lives had
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  Speaker 2: to deal with at a practical level. You want to
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  Speaker 2: read the question. It comes from Jess.
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  Speaker 3: Jess said, on the weekend, Mike just turned three year old,
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  Speaker 3: gave her dummies to the dummy Fairy. She was very,
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  Speaker 3: very attached to them, but had a habit of chewing
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  Speaker 3: on them.
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  Speaker 2: She broke the.
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  Speaker 3: Last one we had, so it was time. She spent
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  Speaker 3: the first couple of nights just heartbreakingly sobbing in her bed.
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  Speaker 3: It must have been so hard for her, such a
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  Speaker 3: huge sleep association, but she was so brave. But we
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  Speaker 3: are now night six and she is going to sleep
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  Speaker 3: well past seven thirty. Her bedtime is usually six thirty.
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  Speaker 3: It's like she doesn't know what to do with herself
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  Speaker 3: once she's in bed, constantly up with a story about
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  Speaker 3: what she needs or doesn't need. My question, what can
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  Speaker 3: I do to help her when she goes to sleep.
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  Speaker 2: Ditch the dummy? Gully? So, I think this is kind
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  Speaker 2: of interesting because none of our kids have ever had
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  Speaker 2: a dummy. We made a decision early on that we
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  Speaker 2: weren't going to do it. I know that some people
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  Speaker 2: would there's no shame if you've given your kids a dummy.
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  Speaker 2: We just decided for ourselves that we weren't going to
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  Speaker 2: do it. We didn't actually want to have to go
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  Speaker 2: through this.
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  Speaker 3: That was definitely part of the reason. And I remember
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  Speaker 3: with each of them there came a point where things
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  Speaker 3: were so tough with sleep patterns and everything that I
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  Speaker 3: even did try with various children to help the situation
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  Speaker 3: move along better.
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  Speaker 2: Well, actually, with Abby, our second one, she didn't sleep
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  Speaker 2: in the early days and well no.
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  Speaker 3: After she was born, she literally screamed for almost twenty
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  Speaker 3: four hours. She just would not stop. The only time
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  Speaker 3: I could actually keep her calm was if she was
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  Speaker 3: lying on top of me, but in the hospital that's
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  Speaker 3: a no go. So they would take her off me
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  Speaker 3: and put her back in the cot on her back,
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  Speaker 3: and she would scream, And so when they left, I'd
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  Speaker 3: put her on my tummy, tummy to dummy, and she
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  Speaker 3: would calm down, and then they'd.
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  Speaker 2: Put the kids.
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  Speaker 1: Sweet.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, it was painful, and it wasn't until my midwife
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  Speaker 3: came in that night and she saw me and I
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  Speaker 3: just looked a her and said, I can't keep doing
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  Speaker 3: this like I am done, and she looked at me.
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  Speaker 3: She put her finger to her lips, she grabbed a dummy,
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  Speaker 3: she shoved that dummy in Abby's mouth, She wrapped it
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  Speaker 3: tight and she placed her on her tummy, in.
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  Speaker 2: On her stomach when gosh a great midwife, and she
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  Speaker 2: wheeled her off.
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  Speaker 3: I didn't see her for six hours.
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  Speaker 2: So do you know if she cried with the dummy.
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  Speaker 3: She didn't, but she didn't have it in her mouth either,
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  Speaker 3: like she literally.
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  Speaker 2: Yea, the dummy didn't make any difference. She just hadn't
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  Speaker 2: been awake for twenty four hours and needed some sleep
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  Speaker 2: and that was the only time she took it. Well,
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  Speaker 2: we think maybe, but we have kind of been through
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  Speaker 2: it with bottles, with baby bottles, because once you stop
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  Speaker 2: breastfeeding and the kids were on bottles, we still had
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  Speaker 2: to get them off that nipple that become very attached
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  Speaker 2: to the boy boy. So let's talk about this before
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  Speaker 2: we answer Jess's question about her three year old. I
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  Speaker 2: think we should just address how to get kids off
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  Speaker 2: the dummy, or, if you're listening in the United States
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  Speaker 2: and some other parts of the world, the pacifier. So
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  Speaker 2: we call them dummies in Australia. Stick the dummy in
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  Speaker 2: the mouth is how we say it. How do we
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  Speaker 2: get our kids off a dummy? And then what do
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  Speaker 2: we do with a three year old who is going
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  Speaker 2: to bed late because she's missing her dummy. We'll answer
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  Speaker 2: those questions right after this.
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  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast.
• 6:02
  Speaker 4: Are Screens Creating tension at home? Tweens, teens? And Screens
• 6:06
  Speaker 4: is a webinar to guide families to healthy, safe superscreen solutions.
• 6:11
  Speaker 4: Bye Today at happyfamilies dot com dot au slash shop.
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: It's the Happy Families Podcast, the podcast for the time
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  Speaker 3: poor parent who just wants answers now, And today we
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  Speaker 3: are answering Jess's question.
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  Speaker 2: How do we ditch the dummy?
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  Speaker 3: How do we ditch the dummy? Well, no, it's not
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  Speaker 3: a really how do we ditch She's done a fabulous
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  Speaker 3: job of ditching the dummy. It's actually, now what.
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  Speaker 2: Do I do?
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  Speaker 3: Because her child is going to bed a lot later
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  Speaker 3: than she would like, I'm.
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  Speaker 2: Probably really tired. So let's talk about dealing with the
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  Speaker 2: three year old shortly. Let's just go through the basic steps,
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  Speaker 2: because there is no doubt at all. The earlier we
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  Speaker 2: can help our kids to get off the dummy, the
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  Speaker 2: easier it is to get rid of it. Like twelve months,
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  Speaker 2: eighteen months, six months, somewhere in there, it's going to
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  Speaker 2: be much easier than two or two and a half
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  Speaker 2: or three or four, And I have been told I
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  Speaker 2: actually don't know if there's any science behind it, so
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  Speaker 2: I want to be careful what I say here, But
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  Speaker 2: I have told that kids having a dummy or a
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  Speaker 2: bottle in their mouth when they're too old it can
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  Speaker 2: bad for their teeth. It pushes against their top teeth apparently,
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  Speaker 2: and changes the structure of the face and does all
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  Speaker 2: we stuff like that, so earlier is definitely better. Number
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  Speaker 2: one tip other than don't give them one in the
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  Speaker 2: first place, which we've already kind of covered off, is
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  Speaker 2: that once it's time, just get them in the habit
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  Speaker 2: of only having it for certain times or certain places.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I think that that's the biggest struggle that we
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  Speaker 3: all have. Whether it be the bottle or the dummy
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  Speaker 3: or a blanky or whatever it is, it actually becomes
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  Speaker 3: a parent's crutch as well.
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  Speaker 2: Because it's convenience.
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  Speaker 3: It's so convenient, we know it's going to work, and
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  Speaker 3: so we give it to them. But what it actually
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  Speaker 3: does is creates this position where finally we've got to
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  Speaker 3: get rid of it, or it gets lost or it
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  Speaker 3: gets broken, and all of a sudden we've got nothing
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  Speaker 3: to replace it.
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  Speaker 2: With And what ends up happening as well is we
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  Speaker 2: sort of say to the kids where you can only
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  Speaker 2: have it in the car, or you can only have
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  Speaker 2: it for sleep time. But then they're having a meltdown
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  Speaker 2: meltdown and they're like, I want the dummy, and we
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  Speaker 2: kind of go, oh, for goodnessakes, it's not worth it.
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  Speaker 2: We talk about this quite a lot as parents. We
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  Speaker 2: need to become a little bit more comfortable with our
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  Speaker 2: children being uncomfortable. Not that we're supposed to be making
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  Speaker 2: them suffer, but when it's time for the child to
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  Speaker 2: get off the dummy, if you've made the decision, then
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  Speaker 2: stick with it. And it may mean that it's going
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  Speaker 2: to be hard for a week or two, but they
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  Speaker 2: do grow through it, they do get over it. So
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  Speaker 2: I would say only certain times or certain places. And
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  Speaker 2: the other thing that I would say is use it
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  Speaker 2: less and less, like, don't use it every time they
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  Speaker 2: say that they need it. Maybe use it every second time,
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  Speaker 2: and then stretching out to every third time and then
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  Speaker 2: stretching out to every fourth time, rather than just going
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  Speaker 2: straight up cold turkey.
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  Speaker 3: As I was listening to you, I couldn't help but
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  Speaker 3: think about one of your justinism's fast as slow and
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  Speaker 3: slow as fast, and that concept that the more we
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  Speaker 3: offer it, the slower the results are going to be.
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  Speaker 3: At the other end, we're using the fast fix. From
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  Speaker 3: the very beginning, the dummies.
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  Speaker 2: Are fast fixed, right, yes, yes, yes.
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  Speaker 3: And from the very beginning that's become we think that's
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  Speaker 3: that's our answer, but we're actually slowing the process down
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  Speaker 3: so much longer.
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  Speaker 2: Well, we're creating a process that didn't need to happen
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  Speaker 2: in the first place if we can avoid it. But again,
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  Speaker 2: once it's happened. There there's a couple of other ideasity
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  Speaker 2: is ful. I've heard a lot of parents and we
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  Speaker 2: actually did this with a couple of our kids. We
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  Speaker 2: cut bigger holes in the nipple of the bottle.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I don't think we actually did. I think they choose.
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  Speaker 2: They choose them now. I distinctly remember getting the scissors out,
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  Speaker 2: all the knife and sort of cutting the top off
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  Speaker 2: one of them, and then they just got angry and
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  Speaker 2: had a big screaming fit, and I thought, oh, what
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  Speaker 2: have I done? Worst dad ever? But eventually they were like, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I think I'm just going to drink out of a
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  Speaker 2: cup from now on.
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  Speaker 3: I Honestly, those tiny little holes. I don't know how they.
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  Speaker 2: Could just I don't know how they don't get sick
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  Speaker 2: of them. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that I would
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  Speaker 2: say is that once the kids are upset because you've
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  Speaker 2: taken it off them, whether it's a bottle or a
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  Speaker 2: blankie or a dummy or whatever it might be, lots
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  Speaker 2: of cuddles, lots of songs, lots of distraction, Like just
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  Speaker 2: get that evening routine. You're essentially taking what has been
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  Speaker 2: a critically important component of the evening routine, the bedtime routine,
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  Speaker 2: out of the routine, which means the whole routine is
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  Speaker 2: up in the air, and so now it's time to
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  Speaker 2: establish a new routine. So you established that new routine
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  Speaker 2: with a little bit of massage or a song or
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  Speaker 2: a story time, whatever it might be that you're going
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  Speaker 2: to do now and say this is how we go
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  Speaker 2: to bed. Now that you're a big girl because you're three,
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  Speaker 2: or even now that you're a big boy because you're two,
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  Speaker 2: whatever it might be, that's going to really make a difference.
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  Speaker 2: One thing that's kind of interesting. A lot of people
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  Speaker 2: like to put their kids to bed with either a
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  Speaker 2: podcast or with some soft music. I came across some
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  Speaker 2: research just the other day that was quite intriguing that
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  Speaker 2: suggested that that may not always be good, either for
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: adults or for children, and that going to bed with
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  Speaker 2: something as close to quiet as possible is usually actually
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  Speaker 2: going to be better for them. I can't remember all
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  Speaker 2: the details of it, but cuddles, songs routine. They will
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  Speaker 2: get used to it. But I'll tell you what, once
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  Speaker 2: you start no going.
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  Speaker 3: Back, that's going to mean there's going to be a
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  Speaker 3: couple of nights, maybe even a couple of weeks of
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  Speaker 3: really huge discomfort for both mum and dad, the whole family,
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  Speaker 3: I say.
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  Speaker 2: Which kind of brings us full circle back to Jess, right, like, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: it's been a week late bedtimes. It's not working out.
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  Speaker 3: So I'm really interested to know what you would tell
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  Speaker 3: Jess or anyone else who's going through this when we've
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  Speaker 3: now we've gone through this difficulty, whether it be replacing
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  Speaker 3: a dummy or you know, losing a loved one, or
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  Speaker 3: there's so many different things that impact our children's lives,
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  Speaker 3: how do we navigate the new norm? Because the new
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  Speaker 3: norm for them is an hour past bedtime.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's a breaking routine. Regardless of what it
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  Speaker 2: is that's doing it, whether it's removing a dummy or
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  Speaker 2: something else. Once the routine gets changed, something has happened here.
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  Speaker 2: There's been a developmental shift. And I think that number one,
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  Speaker 2: I would say, don't worry so much about what time
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  Speaker 2: the baby's going to bed. To me, the time of
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  Speaker 2: the baby going to bed is far less important than
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  Speaker 2: the hours. Yeah, the hours of sleep, the quality of sleep,
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  Speaker 2: and what the process is. So if bedtime's now seven
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  Speaker 2: point thirty, just make it a kind, gentle, patient, loving process.
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  Speaker 2: You might still start at six fifteen and it might
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: just take a little bit longer. Your child will grow
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  Speaker 2: through this, and it might take a few weeks, but
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  Speaker 2: they'll grow through it.
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: I distinctly remember that around that two and a half
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: to three and a half year gap there was when
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  Speaker 3: our children sleep platterns change significantly, and sometimes it meant
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  Speaker 3: even not having sleeps during the day like it was,
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  Speaker 3: there was a significant shift.
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  Speaker 2: I hated that I had it. When they give up
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  Speaker 2: their daytime.
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  Speaker 3: Sleep's like no and so and so an hour an
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  Speaker 3: hour past bedtime feels like a really big deal. But
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  Speaker 3: if she's going to sleep happy and there's a beautiful
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  Speaker 3: routine in place, then I wouldn't be I wouldn't be
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  Speaker 3: sweating that.
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  Speaker 2: We hope that really helps Jess. Thanks so much for
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: sending the email through. If you have any questions that
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: you'd like to ask us, we're happy to help. Podcasts
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: at Podcasts with an SS at happy families dot com
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• 12:45
  Speaker 2: The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Rulan from
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