Need to Advice How to Begin to Wean Son off Bottle.

I would try the Nuby soft tip cups that have the long tip on it first then after you get him on that for a few months move him to the regular soft nuby. I have see this work a few times. You can buy both of these at Walmart. Another thing is I would put some cereal in his last bottle before he goes to bed to see if that will help him sleep better and not wake up so much. Hope this helps!! S.

I have found that kids will let you know when they are ready to be weened. I don't think that there is any set in stone law that says every child must stop using a bottle by a certain age or you risk damaging him forever. He is probably drinking that much because he is growing and hungry. If it important to you that he drinks from a sip cup rather than a bottle, just keep trying and be prepared for some crying and fits. let him know that if he wants something to drink this is the only option available. He will pitch a fit, but simply because it is something new and different. But, No one has ever died from crying, he'll get thirsty enough to breakdown his will and drink from the cup. He'll make the switch when he realizes he can get what he wants to drink faster and more with a sip cup than a bottle.

I would not make this anovernight project but nothing but formula in the bottle asnd over the next couple of months start sub milk for water in the bottle, all juice and then milk in the sippee, they make a sippee that is sort of transitional works something like a bottle, you might look for one, anyway in the next couple of months put only water and he will give up the bottle without a fight.
N. mother of 8 with only one left at home! Thank goodness!

Hi, I am in the club of moms that believe tough love is sometimes the best love. This may sound harsh, but then again, my kids did great with it. I took the bottle away the day my kids turned one. I didn't do sippy cups because they didn't seem to take to them. I did the "Take and Toss" cups with the straw. There are two steps here: 1) Start to put only water in the bottle and formula/milk in the sippy cup. It makes the bottle much less interesting to them. 2) At one, do not give them the bottle - at all. Don't let him see it if he freaks out about it.

The key to this is not to give in. If he sees that you can only go a day and then give in, he will take note. Kids are smart and they constantly test our limits! They are also very resilient. He should be eating plenty of other food by now - that will get him by if it takes a couple of days to get him to drink out of the cup. He will be fine if he goes a few days on limited liquids.

So, good luck, with this or any other method you may try! Hope this helps - let me know!!

Well, I won't say that 5 bottles is too much but I know that at that age my daughter was drinking 2-3- 6-8oz bottles a day. Really at this age, you stop counting ounces and start to focus more on solid foods. He should be able to eat most everything you do for meals even if he doesn't have teeth. My daughter had 2 teeth when she turned a year and we just cut things up small and she would gum everything. I would try to start cutting out one bottle per week and replacing it with either a snack or meal. As far as getting him off the bottle- it may be a little easier to just go cold turkey when you can get him down to 2 bottles a day (morning and bedtime). In the meantime keep giving the sippy cups often too.

Good luck- your baby boy is growing up into a toddler! Time does fly but it is so much fun to watch them become little people!

Get rid of the bottles that is really the only way. With all of my kids and I have four so you could say I am an expert on the subject...lol. Really as long as your child knows there is a bottle availble he/she will want one. I would suggest starting with a sippy cup that has rubber nipple such as the NUBY brand for a little while to get him used to the feel of the sippy cup and gradually work in the other types of sippy cups availble. He/She will protest but remember it is more than just his/her feelings a stake but their teeth and gums. Hope this helps you or others some.

I am very laid back about babies and their bottles. My daughter was still having bottles this often at your son's age. Isay just relax about it for now. Some may disagree (and pedis too) but I say don't worry til about 18 months.

Y., my peditrician used to tell me, that i shouldn't worry about weaning my boys off of the bottle, they'll do it themselves when it's time cause the time is different for each and every child. And then he'd always say, if they start college with a bottle in his mouth, then we have a problem. Good luck, B.

we just swiched over my daughter in dec and she did NOT want to switch. she would take the cup for just a min and then throw it on the floor and scream. luck for us i am more stubborn that she is! we got rid of all the bottles in the house all together! removed them all! it only took one full day and the next morning she realized the bottles weren't comming back and she got over it. we have had no problems since. some wean. we just switched.

We had trouble with this too. We finally had to get tough about it, which was tough since I'm a bit of a pushover most of the time. The soft Nuby cups seem to work well to start out since they feel most like a bottle. Then we just put the bottles away and told him that the cup was all he got. He didn't drink for most of the day, but by the afternoon he was thirsty enough that he took the cup since that's all he had. It only took one day of that and he was to the sippy cup. Don't worry about one day of your son not drinkning as much as usual, kids are very resiliant and this won't hurt him. Sometimes being a mommy is tough business.

What ever you decide to do, you have to stick with it. Consistency is the key in a lot of situations like this. As a mother of two myself (5 - daughter & 2 - son), I would advise you to keep his bottle out of sight when he is having his cup. The more you encourage him to take his cup, the more accustomed to it he will be. Try filling it with healthy drinks that he likes. If he likes juice more than milk, then give him his juice in his sippy cup. Good luck in the future! Don't get discouraged. I really hope this helps.

P.S. The best advice would come from a professional, but from what I recall, my son drank less the older he got. When children begin to eat solids, they don't drink liquids as frequently. In the beginning you would feed your baby (breast/bottle) every two hours. When you begin to add solids to their diet, as they are growing, they won't want or need a bottle/breast as often.

Y.,
I am now a grandmother, but I let both of my sons throw their own bottle out the window of the car. They saw it leave and never asked for one again. Of course, Littering is the problem. Just do it close to home and have your husband come out and pick it up when you and your son are out of sight in the car. Take your son somewhere first, where he will see other children. Tell him "Big Boys and Girls drink out of cups, see. You're a Big Boy too." My oldest son went straight from a bottle to a regular cup or juice glass, never did get attached to a sippy cup. The youngest asked about his bottle and I reminded him what he did and that was that. Praise him for being a Big Boy and getting rid of the old bottle and have a new bright colored sippy cup for him. Take him to someone's house or meet a friend. First thing, tell your friend with a lot of excitement, "My Big Boy threw his old bottle away and now has a new fun sippy cup." Brag a lot on him, let him know how proud you are of him. I kept mine interested with new and different sippy cups for awhile and the bottle was forgotten.
This worked with my granddaughter also.
We are going to have a second grandchild in August 2008. Hope this works for him or her also. I will let you know and ask for help if it does not, but that will be a long time off.
Hope this helps.
Good Luck,
LC

I remember this subject and boy what a time it is to see your tiny baby grow up a little and drink from a cup! I think your method should be tailored to your child's temperament. I think if you can switch your child fast, go for it. But that doesn't work for all children. My daughter dehydrated herself in protest. Unfortunately she has a lot of stubborn blood (irish, scottish, cherokee and german- what a stubborn mix it is!) and simply refused to even look at a sippy cup- no matter how much it looked like a bottle. I decided I wasn't going to put her health on the line just for the sake of switching to a sippy cup. So I gave it back to her and then I tried every day to give her a sippy cup. I also hid bottles one by one as I washed them and replaced them with new, cool looking sippy cups. Eventually she took interest in the pretty colors of the sippy cups and it went pretty smooth from there. The main reason dentists want you to switch to a cup at 1 year is for the health of their teeth, but I found that if you are vigilant about brushing thier teeth and/or gums, they don't rot out or deform like they would love you to believe. My daughter is now nearly 3 (turns in june) and the pediatric dentist I took my kids to actually came into the lobby of his offices and said "I just wanted to meet the mom of the 4 kids with the prettiest teeth I've ever seen in children. You must stay on them about brushing." Now my youngest son just turned 1 and he is trying to get used to sippy cups, but hasn't quite figured out how to the drink from it. But we trade 2 bottles a day with some form of sippy cup. He's okay with it even if he can't figure it out. But all in all, I'd say try to switch, not wean, but don't let your child's overall health suffer in the process. Just like potty training- some children just need more time and will let you know when they are more ready to do it.

Pediatricians recommend babies off the bottle at one year for orthodontic reasons so you are right to be weaning (my dentist friend concurs). I started with the Gerber brand "transition cup" that has a soft spout similar to a nipple, but has removable handles so it looks like a bottle. We called it a bottle, and heated milk in it like we always did with my son's bottle. Maybe you can start the "warm milk in his bottle before bed" thing and then use the transition cup with warm milk later. We always called it his "bottle" like the other and he didn't pay much attention to the transition and took right to it. I would suggest just putting his bottles out of sight completely and trying the new cup. Sometimes you have to be firm and fill it up and give it to him. If he throws a fit, just put it down and walk away or say ok, no bottle and take it away. Then they pull the power play thing and say no, I want it! I know these tricks because now that my son is two, we are transitioning him off of it onto a regular cup. Good luck.

i had a good plan with all 3 of my kids. they now are 30, 23 and 21. we went to the calendar, just looking at it, pointing out my birthday, grandma birthday, easter sunday, alot of days. anyway, then i said "ok, now what day do you want your bottle to go away.?" they usually say never, but then say, "no, you are old enough, now let's pick a day." then on that day, you and your big boy takes it to the curb, and puts it in the trash. now for the next couple of days, he is going to be fussy, and crying. just give him loving, read a book, go get ice cream. anything that will take his mind off the bottle. then time will pass, and he's over the bottle. now, my babies were around 1 1/2 years old before i would even start. you sound like a very nice mom. good luck to him and you.

Too much milk and too little food. Although babies often take a bottle after the age of one milk had a lot of fat in it. Don't think he isn't going to cry for that bottle, sucking is a natural relaxant and a source of comfort for him. What you need to remember is if he is eating well he doesn't need the nourishment of the bottle. I have been a nurse, a mom and a grandma, I still think the easiest way to wean them is all or nothing but he is still a little young. My kids were about 14 months old but only took approximately 3 bottles a day. One day we just decided it was time and my 14 month old and I threw them away and watched the garbage truck take them. We had a few bad moments for about 3 days but then it was over. I think the hard thing about just decreasing the amount is that the baby doesn't understand why sometimes they get one and sometimes they don't so they figure if I cry long enough I will eventually win, and usually they do. If they are gone and they never get one it doesn't seem to take them too long to figure that out either.

A question for you...Do you give him his bottle and let him walk around with it? If so, you might try holding him in your lap and explain to him that if he wants his bottle, he has to sit with you until he is finished with it. If he chooses to carry it around...his only choice would be his sippy cup. I did this with my daughter and it worked great! Although, I do have to say that her only option was taking the bottle from me. Her only choice was mommy feeding her a bottle or taking a sippy cup if she wanted to do it. It didn't take long to move onto no bottles.
If he doesn't walk around with a bottle...you might try to cut him back to 1 bottle (night-time) a day. It might be hard to do, but if he gets thirsty enough, he will eventually take that sippy cup. Try different styles, too. You might find one that he really likes. My kids has their favorites.
Good Luck!
K.

Hi Y.,
My question is, What's the hurry? If he's not ready, don't force the issue. My son was ready to leave the bottle at 18 months, my daughter was ready at 5 months. Every child is different. Keep introducing the sippy but don't fret about the bottle. Eventually he will take the sippy more and you'll be able to remove the bottle without the stress for either of you. As to the amount, babies know how much they need. If he's hungry, feed him.
Just my two cents...

I read your responses and loved your question because I am at the same stage. My daughter is 13 months though. She is eating table food exclusively. I think what I am going to do is at 14 months only give her a night time bottle. I am going to look on the calendar with her everyday and talk to her about no more bottles during the day. Another thing I have to think about is her baby sitter though. I have to make sure she is on board too. I know she will be because she is great, but keep that in mind when you are deciding anything. Good luck and let me know if you hear anything else that is great!

Y., some might say that I'm a harsh mom, cuz I started out at 10 months, they only got a naptime & bedtime bottle, then at 11 months, they only got the bedtime bottle. At 1 yr they didn't get a bottle at all, yes there was some crying, but I happen to have babies that cried rather they had their bottles or not, so it didn't matter, w/ my grandsons, my daughter did the same, & it has worked out just fine. Like I said, some people say I'm a harsh mom, taking the bottle away so soon. But I was determined NOT to have my child running around w/ a bottle hangin out of their mouths at 2 or 3 as I have seen LOTS of kids doing. That or a pacifier. Good luck, it does take a lot of patience.

Try a sippy cup that has a raised spout ( almost nipple like ) Im not sure who makes them, but I found a bottle that had handels on the side, and had a sippy cup nipple to go on it..... ( it had both a regular nipple and sippy cup one as well ) this is what my son RELLY loved..... In fact, he weaned himself off the regular nipple 1 week before he was 1..... It got to where if the "cup" had the regular nipple on it, he would throw it away.... Also try to find one that has bright colors, and pictures, or even one he can decorate himself..... This will make him want it more than the bottle...... ( ps.... this may sound harsh, but you can, take him by the hand and have him watch you throw away his bottles. Tell him these are for babbies, and he is now a BIG boy... Tell him that if he wants a drink he will half to use the BIG boy cup or nothing at all.... my mom used this on my sister and it worked...)

Y.,
I am a mother of 4. Three boys, 19, 17 14 and a girl 2. It sounds to me like your son is doing great. He should be drinking a lot, that is healthy. I would suppliment his bottle with juice in a sippy cup during the day and as he gets older and understands more, you can start talking about drinking out of a "big boy" cup. My goal was always to get them off the bottle by age 2 so they could begin potty training. Every child is different and some take to a cup easier than others. You have to be sensitive to the needs of your child and just don't push him too hard. They grow up so fast anyway!

I tryed to get my son off the bottle when he was about one year old but he stopped drinking his milk. So I tryed it a little bit different. Water and Juice out of the sippy cup and milk from the bottle and that worked great when he was about 18 month old our neighbor was pregnant and we told my son that she needs bottles for the new baby and if he wants to help by giving his bottles to the new baby. ( He loved to share with everything ) so I took the bottles and we had a fuss for a couple of days but he was drinking his milk out of a regular cup and water and juice out of the sippy.It worked for us.
Good luck

I'm a more "mature" mom of 5-ages 27,21,18,15 and 2. In my experience you might want to slow down a bit. If he is this hesitant it's his way of telling you he's not quite ready. What worked for us was to only have juice on the sippee cup, and call it "juice". Anytime he wanted "Juice" it was in the cup. As he got used to drinking more juice he used the cup more. We stayed on the bottle/formula until he was ready to give it up-I remember him being closer to 16 months. It was a gradual process until he was only getting formula at night before bed. Then one night it was his last bottle and he was fine with it. So my advice is to go slowly and let your little guy adjust and he'll tell you when he's ready. Every child is different so don't let anyone make you feel guilty over a "should"-your little guy will do what he needs when he is ready!

Sounds like you are not giving him enough soilds. Replace on bottle with a sippy cup. DO NOT GIVE IN. Best advice get rid of all bottles when he is one. That way you are not tempted to give it to him. It took my daughter one week to get used to the cup. I was afraid she was not getting enough to drink. I almost went back to the bottle but decided to stick it out. Watch to make sure he is peeing regularly. He is right at that age to switch him.At one year he should be getting the cup for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If you give him the bottle in between he will not eat his food. Make a schedule that works for you.

First of all, if you keep giving in to him just because he cries, then you will never wean him off the bottle. Plan a morning when you know you will both be staying home all day. Take the bottle away and throw them out. Don't have anymore in the house. You have to get rid of them. Tell him he is a big boy now and uses a sippy cup, no more bottle. That's it, don't say another word. You will have to ignore him. If you don't, you are reinforcing his behavior. He will learn that crying and throwing a fit gets him what he wants. He will cry and throw a fit, just let him. I know it sounds awful, but after he has finished having his fit, which may take him a couple hours, he will be done with it, drink from the sippy cup and you can move on with life. It does get easier! Just hang in there and be strong.