Rory has used a pacifier since he was a baby.  He got his first taste of a binky when he was in the NICU – not even a full 24 hours old.  Kamryn also used a binky and gave it up completely on her own when she was about 7 months old.  She switched over to sucking her thumb and I tried to get her to go back to the binky for about a week without success.  This is no doubt why I haven’t tried very hard to get Rory to give up his binky.  I hated it when Kamryn sucked her thumb.

On Rory’s 3rd birthday we tried to get rid of his binky, but we discovered that Binky was actually like giving Rory a dose of Ambien and taking it away was like shooting him full of Red Bull.  Another reason I haven’t been forcing him to give it up.

Every day we have multiple instances where Rory is searching for his binky.  We used to have 3 binkies, but we are now down to 1 and I’ll be damned if I go buy anymore.  He’ll ask me where his binky is, I’ll respond that I don’t know and then he’ll say, “You just find it.”  Then he follows me around until I find it asking, “You find my binky?”  Like he wouldn’t be the first I would notify should I find the object of his oral fixation.

This particular binky has been around since Rory was 6 months old.  I’m sure they only have about a 2 month lifespan, but 3 years later, it’s still doing it’s job.  I do examine it every once and awhile to make sure it’s not falling apart, but it’s holding up quite well.  I tried to get him to graduate to an 18 mos+ age binky, but he wouldn’t take it and dubbed it his “yucky binky”.

I don’t allow Rory to take his binky out of the house unless we are going on a trip.  We kept track of Binky fairly well on our trip last week and only had one instance where I thought we had lost it.  We had just boarded the last leg of our flight home and the minute we started to taxi down the runway, Rory was asking for his binky.  I told him he had to wait until the pilot said it was OK to get it out of his bag.  It was 10:00pm, we were all exhausted and Rory just wanted to fall asleep.

As we began to lift into the air, I was trying to remember where I put Binky.  I know Rory had it in the Denver airport, but I didn’t remember picking it up when we got in line to board the plane.  Instant panic struck.  If I didn’t have his binky he was going to be crying the entire way home – not to mention he would be incredibly difficult to get to bed once we did get home.

I was actually starting to sweat a little bit and against Sky Law, I took off my seat belt and started rummaging through all of our carry on luggage.  It wasn’t in Rory’s bag or Kamryn’s and I was sure it wasn’t in mine because how could I not remember putting it in there less than 20 minutes prior?  Never underestimate the mind sucking powers of air travel followed by a full day at a state fair, for there, in the side pocket of my bag was Binky.

I threw Binky over to Rory and decided that we needed to get rid of that thing once and for all.  I can’t be having panic attacks at 30,000 feet over that stupid thing.

Today, Rory once again was searching for Binky and asked me to find it.  I told him I wasn’t going to find it and if he wanted to have a binky, he had to have Yucky Binky.  He agreed and I pulled Yucky Binky out of a drawer and tossed it over to him.  Now I had to hunt down the real deal and hide it.  I found it on the counter in the bathroom and threw it in the drawer.  I was going to throw it in the garbage, but I couldn’t.  My little buddy has been sucking on that thing since he was an infant.  Before he could crawl, walk, or say really funny, inappropriate things.

As it turns out, I’m a little attached to Binky too.  However, I don’t need to see it in his gob.  I’m perfectly happy with it tucked away in a drawer.  Rory gave Yucky Binky a go and he ended up passing out on my bed for 4 hours.When he woke up, he said his teeth hurt.  Perfect.  My master plan is working.  Even if he doesn’t get rid of Yucky Binky for awhile, at least it’s pushing out his teeth a little bit and I’m hoping that after a full night of Yucky Binky, he is going to actually dislike Yucky Binky and give it up completely.