Bringing Baby Home: Pacifier

P is for Pacifier. There is a reason the pacifier was invented. I imagine women have been sticking things into the mouths of newborns for centuries, just to calm them. Infants are soothed by sucking, whether they suck their thumb or fingers, your thumb or finger, a breast or bottle, or a pacifier.

Before my son came, I was not going to use a pacifier. I'd read too many articles about nipple confusion and about trying to break the pacifier habit as the baby gets older. On the second day home from the hospital, tired, sore, and staring at my screaming child, I shoved the hospital Soothie into his mouth. He calmed down and slept. I thanked God for the invention of the pacifier. We used it sparingly over the next few days, got the OK from the pediatrician (another P thing everyone needs) and have been using it since. And they are stashed everywhere. The Soothie in the crib, one in the diaper bag, one attached to a ribbon attached to his clothes, and one to spare. We might become too dependent upon it, but I will cross that road later. Right now, it stands as one object I needed when bringing baby home. One of the many objects I was determined not to need.