The Feelings Behind the Pacifier: What Our Children Really Need When It Goes Away

By Alison Macklin — Certified Hand in Hand Parenting Instructor

If you’ve ever watched your child cling to a pacifier, thumb, lovey, or bottle like it’s the one thing holding their world together, you’re not alone. As adults, we’re not strangers to comfort habits either — caffeine runs, scrolling, biting a pen cap, snacking without hunger, pacing, or even escaping into work or screens when things feel hard.

Our children do something very similar. Only, instead of coffee or a news feed, they might turn to sucking — a pacifier, a thumb, a bottle, even nursing. These soothing mechanisms can become powerful emotional buffers. And when it’s time to let go, there’s often a surge of feeling underneath just waiting to be heard.

Why Pacifiers Can Be So Hard To Remove

Sucking is calming. It shifts the nervous system. Babies aren't wrong to use it because it is instinctual. But when it becomes a long-term emotional coping tool, it can also hold feelings in that need to come out.

Children sometimes turn to sucking when they feel:

Disconnected or unsure of attention
Overstimulated
Lonely, scared, or overwhelmed
Tired but unable to relax
Full of big feelings they haven’t been able to share

When we take away a pacifier or thumb, we remove a buffer. This is when bottled-up feelings come up — and this needs to be handled with warmth and empathy.

What Children Need When the Pacifier Goes Away

Removing the pacifier isn’t just a behavioral transition — it’s an emotional one. And our warm presence is the medicine.

1. Prepare Yourself First

If your child’s sucking habit triggers anxiety or frustration in you, talk it out with a supportive adult first. Once you’ve released your own tension, you can show up grounded and calm for your child.

2. Lead With Connection

Before making a change, fill your child’s cup:

Special Time (one-on-one, child-led play)
Snuggles, eye contact, warmth
Playful affection

When kids feel seen and safe, emotions loosen.

3. Expect Feelings — and Welcome Them

When the pacifier goes away, big emotions arrive. Stay close, stay warm, and say things like:

“I’m right here.”
“I know this is hard.”
“You don’t have to do this alone.”

Crying is not a failure. Crying is emotional processing.

4. Use Play Where Possible

Laughter releases tension. Silly, connection-based play can open emotional pathways and help children feel safe expressing deeper feelings.

5. Move Slowly — Not All Or Nothing

Remove the pacifier in one context first (walks, playtime, naps). Each boundary offers your child a chance to release a little more emotion. Bit by bit, their underlying feelings come out — and their need for the pacifier fades.

6. Trust the Process

Your child isn’t crying because they lack coping skills. They’re crying because they are building coping skills — with you as their anchor.

The Gift Beneath the Tears

The pacifier isn’t the story. The feelings are the story. And your presence is the resolution.

When children release stored feelings with connection, they become:

More playful and curious
More confident and flexible
Better sleepers
More connected to us
More emotionally resilient

A Friend’s Pacifier Story: A Turning Point Through Listening

A friend of mine navigated this with her 18-month-old, who was intensely dependent on the pacifier for sleep. Nothing soothed her except sucking, and the dependency became overwhelming for everyone.

Discovering the Hand in Hand Parenting approach changed everything. Through Staylistening — staying close, offering warmth, and allowing full emotional release — her daughter finally slept deeply without the pacifier for the first time ever.

Night by night, the crying shortened. Sleep improved. Their connection deepened. And her daughter became lighter, more present, more confident.

You Don’t Need to Do This Alone

Helping a child through emotional transitions is courageous work. You are not causing crying — you’re allowing healing.

Your child emerges more settled, more secure, more themselves on the other side.

If you'd like support, feel free to reach out. You don’t have to navigate this alone.

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