I've been a bad blogger lately. I keep thinking of little snippets of things that I'd like to say, but nothing of any substance.
We've been rocking the new diet lately. I found a new book that is SO helpful in narrowing down the best types of food to eat and supplements to take for my particular condition. The book is here. It is authored by a reproductive endocrinologist and a specialist in Traditional Chinese Medicine. It sounds SO not like the kind of book I'd like, but it is really helpful. The doctor was once involved in IVF and didn't like it because he felt like he was "playing God" so he started looking for ways to improve a woman's fertility so that pregnancy could occur in the usual way. Although he argues pretty strongly for IVF as an absolute LAST resort after trying to fix fertility surgically, hormonally and with improved nutrition, he does also refer for and help couples prepare their bodies for IVF. Unfortunately, given my beliefs about life and how IVF factors into that, I would have a very hard time recommending this book to just anyone. But for the nutrition help, it is definitely worth a read. I have even found the Chinese medicine stuff (herbs and supplements) to be helpful! And best of all, it takes the view that "80% is perfection"...meaning that I'm ALLOWED to cheat on my diet once in awhile. We are looking for overall change and effect, not absolute adherence to the "rules". I can't tell you how freeing that was!!
We've been researching adoption agencies lately. Our current agency isn't getting us anywhere, and at the end of this month our homestudy expires and we will have been with them for two years with no talk of a match. We've decided to let it lie for several months...work the new diet and see how it affects hormones and fertility. If we get to the Fall and things still aren't looking up in the fertility area, we have a new agency in mind that is FAST. Expensive, but fast. They have a good reputation and are very good about counseling and support of birth parents, so I think it will be worth the extra money to work with them.
In the meantime...anyone have any ideas about how to get a very-security-item-dependent three-year-old to kick the paci habit? It's well past time, but she cannot settle down without it (and blankie, but blankie can stay awhile). At this point, one without the other just won't cut it. If we get in the car and forget paci and blankie, and she gets tired or upset, she WILL NOT STOP SCREAMING until she passes out from sheer exhaustion. She's old enough (and verbal enough) to deliver very involved monologues about why she NEEDS these things and how they make her feel better. She will use all of her powers of persuasion to make them appear out of thin air. She refuses to accept that they are not (even temporarily) available to her at her need.
But a kid at her age should be able to soothe herself without something sticking in her mouth, right?
3 comments:
Asher was about Olivia's age (maybe a few months younger) when we broke the habit. He had strep throat, and we needed to throw them away for germ reasons, and I just wasn't going to buy new pacis for a 3-yr-old boy. So I talked to him about it ahead of time, set a definite date (Sunday is the last day for your paci), and then when the time came, we threw kind of a going away party - decorated a gift bag for them, and said good-bye to them. We decided the pacis were going to the babies at the hospital, and put them in the gift bag to "send" to them there.
It took Asher about 10 minutes the first night to settle down. After that, he never missed it, and went right to sleep. But that's because he really was ready to give them up. When we tried to get rid of them when he was two, it was TOTAL misery. We tried for a month before he found a rogue paci, and I gave up and let him keep it.
Good luck.
From 1 year, we didn't let C have his paci or R suck her "lingers" (ha) but they were both VERY attached at night time. I'm pretty sure Calvin was 3 when we loaded them up (with his help) into a big envelope and sent them off to Africa (play along!) ;) for the babies there who didn't have one. (My sis was a missionary there at the time, which helped.) The first night was rough, but not as bad as we thought.
If you're really ready for her to be done, just dig your heels in and suffer through the next day or two. She'll see that you mean business. It's just a habit she's in, and you're right - she'll be able to figure out how to self-soothe! She's just never been forced to learn until now. (And our kids were the exact same way!)
Good luck. :)
Believe it or not, I have students who suck their thumbs in class!!! I teach HIGH SCHOOL!
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