M started to nap in the old school sarong rocker when she was two months old. It allowed her to nap for longer stretches of time and allowed me to take a break. She was quite a ‘cry baby’ then, so we introduced the pacifier around the same time but kept it strictly for sleep. We even played soothing music at times to induce her to dreamland.

When her daily routine stabilised around six months, we started to wean her off the pacifier and music. The music was easy; we just stopped playing. As for weaning her off the pacifier, we first started with the afternoon naps. I would let her fall asleep with it and then try to remove it after she falls into deep sleep. At times, it startled her and I had to let her have it again. But after a week or so, she did not even need it to fall asleep. We then went on to do the same thing when she sleeps at night. All was well and the pacifier became reserved for emergency only.

But the sarong rocker remained our ultimate life-saver…

So much so that M would only want to nap in it. But as she grew substantially heavier, we began to worry about her falling out of it. Her weight gradually caused the sarong to sink lower and lower such that if her legs dangled out she could touch the floor.

I first tried to get her to nap in her cot when she around 1.5 years old but no matter what I did (milk, pacifier, music), I was unsuccessful. She would stand in her cot, point to her sarong rocker and cry till I brought her there.

Disheartened by the attempts, I did not try again till a couple of months later. This time round, the first attempt was already encouraging; even though I needed to re-introduce the pacifier and soothing music. She would cry when I put her in her cot; I would come back in with the pacifier and she would fall asleep after a while. Hence, I managed to get rid of the sarong rocker at the expense of the two lesser evils.

Not willing to settle at this, I tried not giving her the pacifier a few days later and she could fall asleep on her own! That made my day. Left with the least of the three evils – soothing music, I was really not in a hurry. And getting rid of it proved to be a breeze…