Well Operation Get Rid of Passer was a failure.  When I first snipped the tip of the pacifier it was rendered unsuckable.  Maddie had a difficult time going to bed that night.  The next morning when she woke us up at the lovely time of 5:30, she showed me her pacifier and told me, "Daddy cut it." I'm glad he took the blame for that.  :)  Since she could still chew on the pacifier, she was not willing to let it go.

A couple of days later I cut off even more, meaning if Maddie wanted the pacifier in her mouth she had to hold it there with her hand.  This did not make her very happy.  She still had a hard time going to bed and woke up SUPER early in a terrible mood.

Yesterday morning Maddie decided to give her pacifier to Baby Brother.  Awww. . . . Later that morning we went to the library and one of the books we checked out was Pacifiers are not Forever.  She had Eric read it to her three times before bed last night!  Maybe we were making progress?  When Eric put Maddie in bed he reminded her that she had given her pacifier away.  She fussed some, like we expected, but around 2 in the morning she had a total meltdown.

Earlier in the evening Eric and I had discussed the fact that her waking up ridiculously early (and in a bad mood) was taking a toll on  us.  Maddie is also anxious to move into her toddler bed since she saw us putting it together in the garage the other day.  We thought that if we put her in her toddler bed without a pacifier she would be out of it constantly and fussing at our bedside.  In addition to all of this, Eric is going to be leaving for a two week training soon and he didn't like the idea of me handling all of this craziness by myself.  So at about 2:30 this morning we caved and gave her an uncut pacifier.  She didn't get out of her crib until 7 this morning and she was absolutely, positively cheerful when I picked her up.

Does giving her pacifier back to her mean that it's going to be harder on all of us the next time we try to take it away?  I'm afraid so.  Eric is optimistic and thinks that when she's ready to give it up it won't be so hard.  I guess we'll have to wait and see.