But this is a girl with a mouth full of teeth. The inevitable chewing on the bottle's nipple was occurring, obvious by the little breaks I was beginning to see in it. I had already thrown away one nipple that a had a large tear chewed open in it. When I was getting her ready for her nap today, I noticed that the nipple on the bottle she'd had last night also had a large tear, such that if I had put water in the bottle for her, it would have poured out. I let her take it to bed for her nap, but told her no water. A foolish thing to do, I admit, as she could easily have swallowed a piece of the silicon if it had been chewed off. But she had the bottle, empty though it was, and she was happy.
Well tonight, I decided that it was a perfect time to put an end to all this bottle stuff. I easily pulled off the tip of the damaged nipple and threw the small piece away. I showed her the bottle and how it was broken now. I said we couldn't use it anymore. I gave her a drink, "like a big girl", out of a cup, sang her a song and put her to bed. She asked, "Bottle?" I reminded her it was broken, prayed with her and kissed her, and walked out holding my breath. Not a peep.
About 15 minutes later Scott and I stood outside her bedroom door. She was making some little sounds... seemed like a sort of "ahhhh" and then fingers tapping over her mouth to interupt the noise. She was finding some other thing to do with her mouth as she fell asleep.
Now it has only been a couple of hours since she's been asleep. I don't know how often that empty bottle was going into her mouth in the night for momentary comfort. I guess I can let you know tomorrow how she made it through the night.
But for now, she's made one more little step toward growing up.
No longer the baby herself, today Gwen got to hold our friends' one month old baby, Owen. Do you think she's pleased?!
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