I’m coming from a place of …how-you-say….Nipple Nazi?? I forget what the term is, but essentially I’ve been brainwashed from an early age by my Lactation Consultant mom that Breast is Best. I breastfed my Cabbage Patch dolls.
So, one might confuse my beliefs with that of anti-pacifier. Not anymore my friends, not anymore. I have been trying to shove that thing in Liam’s mouth for weeks now, thinking it would help calm him in the carseat. We’ve tried two different kinds. He would just coo and smile at me, blow bubbles and lick the pacifier. So I’m all, stop making out with the pacifier Baby and he gags as he tries to suck it in.
I was persistent though. And I have persevered. I have walked into the magenta crying abyss and crawled out a broken woman…but with 2 hours straight of a quiet car ride to Cape Cod from Maine! No, it does not take 2 hours to get to Cape Cod…the other hour+ was split up into crying spells in the beginning and then at the end when he woke up and was ravenous.
I was sitting in the back seat with him and for 20 minutes he was fine. Then it began. We pulled over twice so that I could calm him outside of the car. I thought that there was no way in hell we could drive the rest of the way (what were we thinking anyway???) He got to the really bad place. The sweat, the stare, and oh lord he started clawing and raking at his face. I thought I was torturing him even more by sticking that pacifier on his tongue and moving it around his lips. He looked at me like I was waterboarding him or pulling off his fingernails. And THEN…he pulled it in and sucked. And in full-on Maggie Simpson style he continued an aggressive suck on that piece of heaven. His eyes drooped within a minute and his body relaxed. His body temperature dropped to a normal degree. I could almost breathe. I would have clapped with glee except that he still had a grip on both of my pointer fingers with both of his hands.
One thing only…every time we went over a bump he would get that baby startle with no-control over his arms and they would fly up and knock that pacifier out of his mouth. Fine. Since I was sitting in the back seat I could swiftly poke it back in his mouth…but what will happen when I have The Boy in the car by myself?
One miracle at a time I suppose.
