Pediatricians recommend that you wean your baby off the bottle by age 12 months. With Cal, I postponed it to 15 and of course, as a first-time mom, I was paranoid about it and felt a little guilty. This time around, which seems like much more than just two years later, I let my little girl hang onto her bottle until 18 months with no regrets. It was just so convenient and she loved it so much...why be in a rush to give up something so good? In fact, part of me still wonders, "What's wrong with letting her have a bottle until age two? Can't we just push it back to age two? I think I know a couple of two-year-olds who carry a bottle around, right?" However, my conscience got the better of me and after several weeks of half-heartedly talking to her about "throwing her bottles away," a ceremonial ritual that seemed to work well with Cal, I decided on Monday to go ahead and do it. And I've got to tell you something...it ain't going so well.
I guess I was thinking she was good enough on a sippee cup that it would be a pretty smooth transition. Wrong. I was forgetting how much of drinking a bottle is a comfort to an 18-month-old. While the first day of sippees may have seemed like a novelty to her, she has since realized that she's supposed to get ALL of her milk from a sippee cup from now on and is pretty sad about it, especially at nap time and bed time. Thankfully she likes to drink water out of an open cup sometimes. I say thankfully since my primary worry about her during this has been dehydration. In fact, this morning at breakfast I was sitting across the table from her. She had an open up of water on one side of her and the new sippee I'd bought her on the other side, full of milk. In a telling moment, I watched her look from one to the other two or three times. Then she reached for the water. Maybe this means we'll skip the sippee stage altogether!
7 comments:
I went through the same exact thing...Lauren at 15 months and no prob...Kristen still wants it. She settles for a sippy cup though after some fuss!
I like the bottle pic. Nice.
We're into the bottle stage now, too. It is quite a comfort. Hang in there, Monica! You can do it!
stay strong :) How can you say no to those blonde curls and blue eyes?!? ;)
So much easier said than done...and each kid is different. David had a binky until he was 3. None of my last kids would have one at all. Maners (2-1/2) still occasionally asks for a bottle. I usually just give her one, but I fill it mostly with water with only a tiny bit of milk to top it off - just enough to make it white. It looks like milk, but doesn't really taste like it. Her requests just get gradually further apart. Everyone stays happy! This is in the category of things Tom's mom told me to not stress out about. She told me that by the time David was 15 he wouldn't likely still have a binky, not know how to use the potty, sleep with a silky,etc., etc. Most likely, everything will work out just fine. Besides, 18 months is still a baby...even though you're getting another one...
Ange, You're doing great. I hope that Monica is dealing okay now, but mostly hope that you're getting some rest. You're working really hard every day--growing all those parts for your sweet little one on the way--so if she can't quite 'kick' the habit yet, and it gives you some peace, i say, hey, why not?
you asked how we knew about Evie's glasses--if you read back in my blog a few earlier posts i explain it all in a post called "glasses" :) good luck with all you're busy with!
you're a great mother!
It's fun to see how each child is so different. You are smart to use your maternal insticts to make those decisions. Som moms stress out big time because they think they have to follow an exact time lime that an expert has published.
I had no idea that there was some timeline for getting kids off the bottle. Simon is nearing 2 years old and he still drinks several bottles of milk per day. But he drinks easily from his sippies and a regular cup too, doesn't have to be coaxed at all.
The one advantage of the bottle is that he will drink it all, from start to finish. Seems to be working for now.
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