Sucker!

Kate is a sucker.

It started when they wheeled her into our hospital room after a short stint in the newborn nursery. They brought in my precious new baby with an orange paci bobbing up and down in her mouth.

"Oh? A paci?" I said to the nurse.

"She's going to town . . . I think she likes it," the nurse replied as she smiled sweetly at me.

It's OK. I thought. She's a newborn, a paci is certainly no big deal.

Then we came home, and it continued. I'd find Jim sticking the paci in her mouth any time she squealed, and it worked like nothing else to calm her down. He started carrying them around in his pocket, ready on demand with the lovely orange pacis. I, on the other hand, couldn't get used to the idea. I remember playing in the basement with the girls one of the first mornings I was home alone with them . . . and having to run back upstairs for a paci once I realized (after a few minutes of crying) what Kate really wanted.

So, she likes the pacifier. I thought. As long as we don't get hooked on it for sleeping.

We started having to take pacifiers along with us . . . in the diaper bag, in the car seat, one 'emergency paci' that stayed in the car. We had to order more of the hospital-grade pacis that she loved . . . naturally, the ones that Kate was hooked on couldn't be bought in the store, so we ordered on-line. For our little sucker Kate, the paci became a staple very, VERY quickly. One month into life, I would say she was hooked.

But For 12 + weeks, I held out on that sleeping thing. No paci in the crib. We'd let her suck away while drifting off, but Jim and I religiously took it out of her mouth before putting her down to sleep. I was vigilant about removing the paci. No baby of mine was going to become dependant on it for sleep . . . I wasn't going to be a mom that had to get up in the middle of the night to stick the paci back in my baby's mouth.

Okay, so this is going to stick around a while. I thought. But not when she becomes a toddler. Surely we can take it away after her first birthday. That, I can live with.

What's my problem? you might ask. Why am I so weird about the paci? Well, Meg never took one. Not from day one. We tried . . . oh, did we try. I even remember friends asking, "Won't she take a paci?" when she would cry in public. NO. Not Meg. No paci for her.

And I soon realized how easy it was . . . no need to carry them around, no need to worry about taking it away in the toddler years. I realized it was a treat NOT to have a baby that needed a paci . . . so when my second baby came along, I envisioned it would be just as easy. I tried and tried to keep my little Katy-did from falling in love with that little soothing devil. But to no avail.

And now she's found her fingers.

It's karma. It's revenge (on God's part). It is my worst nightmare. Many of you do not know that I was once a thumb sucker . . . um, until I was 12 years old. I sucked my left thumb from birth until the summer break between 6th and 7th grade. It's embarrassing to admit, but it's the truth.

Having a kid who sucks a finger would only be fitting for me. It's God's "Gotcha!" He's giving me a taste of what I imagine my parents went through with me.

Since the discovery of her hands and the development of her ability to get them successfully into her mouth, the paci is somewhat a thing of the past for Kate. She has locked in on the middle and ring fingers of her left hand, and she won't let go. I can watch her . . . her little hand will float around in front of her face until the fingers land ever so gracefully between her lips . . . then into her mouth they go.

Can't take her fingers away when she becomes a toddler. She could suck those things right into her teenage years. I envision my 16 year old Kate, learning to drive with her right hand on the wheel and her left hand in her mouth. (Yes, I'm exaggerating. But it could happen.)

The good parts? Okay, there are some. I can let her lay down on her own and count on those fingers to find her mouth as her eyes to start rolling back into sleep . . . without being rocked or coddled. You don't have to pack her fingers . . . they go with us everywhere. And, let's face it . . . it's cute to see her sucking away on her little hand.

Oh well. As I toss my hands in the air, I think . . . What can I do? She's a baby. If it comforts her, so be it.

I just wish I hadn't been such a Nazi about the paci. Who's the real sucker now?