So Now How Do I Get Him To Stop?

Bagel cut his finger pretty bad a while back, and it was an ordeal to bandage him. I had to bandage his unhurt hand to keep him from using it to rip the bandages off his hurt hand. He screamed and he protested mightily. But after a few days he was used to the bandage, and he left it alone. He would even let me change it, and he got into the routine of changing it, naming the various items we used in order (ointment, bandaid, wrap). And when we went to my folks' house for Christmas and I forgot to bring the Vetrap, he even let me put just a band-aid on it, without having to wrap it up in Vetrap-- and he kept it on! If you've ever bandaged a two-year-old, you'll know this is astonishing.

Yesterday his bandage fell off by itself. He immediately came to me waving his finger in the air and crying about it. It was time to change it anyway so I took a look at the wound and it was healed enough that it didn't need a bandage and could use some air. I told him his finger was all better and he didn't need a bandage, but he just couldn't accept that. He screamed that he was "bleeding" until I put a new bandage on, at which point he calmed down instantly and went about his business. He uses the word "bleeding" for pain (touching the snow with bare hands causes "bleeding") but I knew this wound was healed to the point where it couldn't be hurting all that much. Evidently he's added the bandage to his world, to the point where taking it away disrupts his world.

So now that I've got him used to wearing a bandage, how do I get him un-used to it?

I suppose I'll probably have to do much the same thing as I did when I put the bandage on: endure a lot of screaming and squirming. Maybe tomorrow, when FH is home and we can tag-team.