Bye, Bye Baby!

My littlest one is growing up. I know this, it just hit sometimes. Months ago, I took his binkie away from him. He was a bit older than any of my other children, but I was convinced that he would stop napping if I took it away. (This is a familiar theme to my efforts with him). I finally hid all binkies (by this time, I was down from 4 to 1), and he did just fine. Didn't even ask for it.

Well, if he sees something baby, he asks for it. He saw a bottle the other day, and insisted on having it. I put milk in it, and he sat at the breakfast table eating his cereal, and drinking out of his bottle. Once he forgot about it, I hid it again. Yesterday, he spotted a binkie while I was cleaning out our junk drawer. I didn't even realize what he saw, but he was pointing at the drawer and saying, "B! B!" I offered him what I thought he wanted, but he just kept pointing. Finally, I saw the binkie right under my nose, and realized my mistake. I washed it off, and gave it to him. He popped it into his mouth, and went happily on his way.

Dad wasn't quite as melted by a little boy with a binkie in his mouth, and he looked at J and said, "Ew! That's yuckie. You need to go throw that away in the garbage." J slowly walked back into the kitchen, stopped at the garbage that was out while I was throwing away junk from the junk drawer, looked at the garbage can, looked up at me, and slowly, took the binkie out of his mouth and placed it gently on the top of all the papers in it.

I was a puddle on the floor. He UNDERSTOOD what Dad had said to him. He obeyed what Dad said to him. He threw his binkie away in the garbage. All these grown-up things hitting me in my soft spot all at once, I swept him up into my arms and hugged him close, telling him exactly how proud of him I was. And, as I was so soft and weak at this point, when he looked back at the binkie and asked softly, "B?", I forgot all about that nasty two letter word. I picked up the binkie, washed it off, and handed it right back to him. He proudly put it right back where it belonged, under the frusterated glare of Dad.

I KNEW he shouldn't have that binkie, I KNEW I didn't want him to have it, but "I'm just a girl who cain't say no!" Holding his tiny body against me, feeling his small bones with no padding, seeing his little gap-tooth smile... Knowing wasn't enough to change the feelings.

While I was holding him in my arms, he spotted something else he wanted. One of his sisters had left a piece of candy on the counter. He pointed at it and asked for it (I think his word for it is "D"). Seeing a more gentle approach, I grabbed the candy, put him down on the floor to stand in front of me, and held the candy up to him. "You can have this candy if you put your binkie back in the garbage." I had to repeat my request once more, and he looked a bit puzzled at the candy, and the garbage, but it didn't take him long at all to abandon that binkie to the garbage in favor of the candy. He smiled so happily as he put that candy into his tiny little mouth!

This time, when he wasn't looking, I moved the binkie lower into the garbage, so he couldn't see it the few times that he came back to look for it. He did make a little whiney noise when I tied up the full bag and took it out to the can, but no crying. He is so proud of all of his accomplishments; almost as proud as his old mom.

In the corner of the kitchen is another junk drawer, where I put all the kids crayons and such that they use to color with at the kitchen table. Today, I opened it with J on my hip to put something inside, and saw the other binkie I'd put in there to hide from J. Dad doesn't know about that binkie. J may have glimpsed it, he made a little noise, but I hurridly closed the drawer and moved away. Why don't I just throw it away? If this story doesn't answer that question, you don't understand the story.