need help switching to wcm

lana22

my son is a week shy of 13 months. we didn't start weaning him off bottles/formula around his first bday cause he was sick, but started a little over a week ago. for the past few months he's had four bottles of 8 oz a day. dropping one has been very easy, but the past couple days i've tried to drop a second and had a lot of trouble. at some point during the day he just loses his mind and it's clear he's hungry. he's a very healthy eater and it seems to me that he's eating a lot during his meals, but clearly not enough.

our schedule (roughly) with bottles was 7:15 bottle, 9am breakfast, 11:15 bottle, 12:30 lunch, 3:15 bottle, 5:00 dinner, 6:30 bottle. my DH thinks we got him conditioned to eat 7x per day, and so he is just expecting more food and therefore getting cranky when he's not getting it, and his meals/milk are not properly supplementing what he's missing from the formula. i haven't even attempted to take away the morning and pre bedtime bottles, because dropping the second one has been so hard.

i read an old thread where lots of people had no trouble just packing up the bottles and switching, but anyone been in a similar situation to me and solved it? should i keep trying to switch him straight to sippy? today out of desperation i gave him 4 oz of formula, he continued to freak out with hunger, so i then gave him 4 oz of milk in the bottle and he gulped it down no problem and was fine after. i'd been trying to avoid putting milk in the bottles cause i figured it was better to get him straight to cups, but that doesn't seem to be working well. he clearly doesn't drink as well out of cups as he does the bottle. i have about six different brands (reg sippy/straw) and keep hoping one of them takes, but maybe i'm doing more harm than good by giving him so many different options.

sorry for tl;dr, but any advice is appreciated! thanks!!

Caseyk1127

My pedi said at 12 months DS should get 12-14oz of milk a day plus water (or diluted juice). We didn't have any trouble dropping ounces but we still do 2 bottles a day instead of cups only because DD came when DS was only 14 months and he saw her bottles. Here is his schedule (times are rough estimates):

6:30 am - bottle of milk (6oz)

8:30 am - breakfast with sippy of water

10:30 am - snack  with sippy of water

12:00 - lunch, water or juice

2:00 - snack and water

5:30 - water while I cook dinner

6:00 pm - dinner and water

7:00 pm - bottle of milk (6oz)

 It seems like I offer alot of water but he sometimes only takes 1 sip and he's done other times he chugs the whole cup. If its a non snack time and he's cranky it usually means he's thirsty and wants a cup of water. He's a super great eater too. It looks like maybe you need to add some small snacks to your schedule.  

lana22

CurlingRocks:

I agree you might be giving too much if you are doing 32 oz. milk/formula.  We didn't have many issues switching, though.  Sorry I'm not more help. 

not giving 32 oz of formula and milk -- pedi told me max of 6 oz of milk at a time and i think no more than 18 oz./day. not that it matters, he's not coming close to that right now. he was always on the high side for formula he drank but he's off the charts in height and over 75% in weight so pedi was never concerned.

 

 

lana22

mbenit4:

He is only 13 months. IMO, dropping bottles isn't a big deal right at one.

From reading your posts, you have 2 things you are trying to change - from bottles to cups and then you are trying to drop a bottle.

I never focused on dropping bottles. This will happen as they eat more food. What I did do was change from formula to whole milk. I did give my son the toddler formula for a while and I would offer him whole milk during the day. That was one issue.

Then the switch from bottles to sippy. They will all turn down milk in cups if they know you will give in and put it in a bottle. Both of mine did this. I was all in a panic until one day I really did forget my DD's bottle at home when I dropped her off to grandma's. I pick her up and she was drinking the milk fine. Her grandma just told her that there weren't any bottles at her house and if she wanted to drink milk she had to out of the sippy. She did.

Anyway, I have had more problems with straw sippys then I would like to talk about. What worked for us was a soft tip Nuby sippy. Whatever you use, just put the milk in there and be done with it. He will tantrum if you have given in to the bottles in the past.

Right now, though I think you are changing too much. Decide what are you tackling first? Off formula to whole milk. Off bottles to cups. Go with one first. Give yourself some slack too. He is only 13 months. My son's milk intake went down after solids on its own. Now my son asks for milk and might drink about 20oz or more a day and he has a healthy appetite. I don't find it to be an issue.

thanks everyone and esp above poster. really appreciate help!