Bye~Bye Binky!

I am happy to announce that Gavin has been off the Binky for 2 weeks now! HOORAY!!! He turns 2 in August, and has had his binky the longest out of our 3 kids. Lindsay was done with hers at 11 months. It was by accident. Dan and I went to Disneyland with our friends Hayley and Justin and we left our little Lindsay home with both of our parents (each having her for 2 days). I had put the binky in the diaper bag in a baggy but nobody remembered it was in there and she was such a good baby that they never needed to give it to her. So when we got back and I realized she'd hadn't had it for 4 days, I chucked it!
Zane was 15 months old when we got rid of his and it was mostly by force. Once again we were in Disneyland, but he and Lindsay were with us. Towards the end of the trip I noticed that his one and ONLY binky had been bitten through and there was a little bit of food inside the nipple! GAG! I wanted to hurl! So we had no choice but to throw it away and I was not about to buy another one. The next day we left to drive back to Utah and that was the worst. He screamed for about an hour and a half in the car. I thought I was going to lose my mind, but eventually he fell asleep and that was the end of it.
So, Dan and I have been trying to slowly get Gavin off of the binky for about 4 months. In February we decided to only let him have it in his crib (naptime and bedtime). There were many times he'd fight us on it, trying to bite on the binky so we couldn't get it out. Then when we went to St. George in March, he got really sick with Croup and the binky was all he wanted ALL day long. So back to square one. Slowly we got back to just having it in the crib. Then 2 weeks ago I was feeling motivated and he wasn't sick for a brief moment in time, so I cut the top off! I was so scared to do it (I know, I'm pathetic) but it was his only binky. At naptime, I laid him down and he said "Plaaa!" which is what he calls it. He started calling it that because whenever we'd tell him to spit it out into his crib we'd say, "spit out your bkiny, PLAAAA!" Kinda funny! So he had asked for it, I handed it to him, he put it in his mouth, tied to suck on it and pulled it out with a confused look. He looked at it and then handed it to me. I said, "uh, oh, your Plaaaa is broken." Then he wanted it back, but then took it back out and handed it to me again. I said, "should we throw it away?" He said "NO!" I gave it back and walked out, shutting the door. He cried for about 20 minutes, so I got him out and had him lay on my bed but he never went to sleep so he never had a nap that day. That night at bedtime, he asked for it again but I told him it was all gone. He cried for an hour that night! That was the hardest part, but I knew I had to be strong and not get him out. Well, that was it. He's asked for it a couple of times since, but I just tell him it's broken and all gone. He's fine with that answer. YEA!!!!