I have a couple maybe even a few :) But I've been on the baby Center.com community thingy and a lot of moms that have babies the age of Cayden have been already taking away the bottles!! So here are my questions.. And please feel free to say whatever.. I'm not offended..
Here's a little info first.. Cayden is almost 13 months. Has about 2-3 bottles a day- One in the morning when he wakes up - one (or two depends on the number of naps) for a nap - one for night time. Cayden is VERY attached to his bottle and blankie - must have them for naps and bed time or he won't go to sleep. He does take it in his bed (which I've read that's bad.. why??). We're trying to feed him the 3 meals a day but its hard when I'm exhausted (lazy- but working on that..). And he LOVES his sippy cups but they're not the soft nipple kind.
Questions:
1. when should he be off the bottle? Should I let him decide?
2. Is it bad that he is having "Milk bottles" instead of water or juice in the bottle for naps and bedtime?
3. When should he be able to go to sleep on his own without a bottle?
4. Do you guys have a schedule set in place -with naps, getting up for the day, baths, food?
Any advice, suggestions anything will be much appreciated! I just want him to be happy and healthy and not get into a bad habit of needing a bottle to sleep. So please help!! :) Thank you.
Good and Wise Parents
1 year ago
5 comments:
1. when should he be off the bottle? Should I let him decide?
My pediatrician said no more bottle after 12 mos.
2. Is it bad that he is having "Milk bottles" instead of water or juice in the bottle for naps and bedtime?
Despite what my dr. said, we still had one bottle feeding a night for bedtime until they were about 16 mos. We gave them sippies with diluted juice during the day. Then we transitioned into putting milk in a sippie for bedtime. They still have a milk sippy almost every night.
3. When should he be able to go to sleep on his own without a bottle?
He shouldn't be sleeping with the bottle- it rots teeth. I'm not sure if that is your question or not.
4. Do you guys have a schedule set in place -with naps, getting up for the day, baths, food?
Yes! I am totally schedule oriented. Here was the schedule when my twins were 1 yr.
6:30 wakeup
diaper change
breakfast
8:30-10:00 nap
diaper change
lunch
10:30-12:00 running errands
1-4pm nap
diaper change
dinner
6:30 milk sippy
7:00 bath
7:15 bedtime!
They still have mostly the same schedule, but they have dropped the 1st nap. And we moved the second nap up to 12:30.
Hope it helps!
You've already gotten this advice from me ;)...but you know how I am, so I'll post it again!
1. Dr's always push for 12-18 months. But Aube is 2 and still has one....Bella was pushing 2 1/2 before I cut her off. Some kids breast feed till 3 or 4, so I figure a bottle can't damage them anymore than that!
2. I always give my girls milk at night...and diluted juice during the day. Mostly apple juice, but sometimes grape/apple juice is fun, too. Mom used to give us Kool-aid in our bottles ;).
3. It took Bella a long time to go to sleep on her own, and still takes her awhile now...I think that is just a process. But going to sleep without CRYING is another foe to conquer. When we finally weaned Bella from actually going to sleep WITH her bottle....we just started up a routine. James read her a book while she drank her bottle (then eventually a sippee cup) then, i would take her in and sing to her, put her in bed and she would cry and cry...but you just go in and reassure them every so often, and they finally get the hint.
4. Gotta have a schedule! Kids THRIVE on schedules.
Wake up around 8:30/9ish
breakfast
play
play/movie/run errands
play
lunch around 12ish
play
naps from like 2-4 or whenever.
play, waiting for daddy, mommy is sometimes working ;)
dinner between 6:30-7:30ish
start bedtime stuff at 8.
Geez...that's a lame schedule. Hehe...we don't do much around here!!
Good luck. Don't worry too much about it, just do the best you can! It's hardest with the 1st...we started some bad habits with Bella and it was hard to break her, but she is fine now! Well, kinda! LOL.
I know how it is, going on to those parent websites and you start questioning yourself. If you feel confident about what you're doing as a mom, then that's totally fine. There are certain things, though, like having them fall asleep with the bottle/sippy cup of milk or juice, because it rots their teeth.
Cohen never even liked bottles, so we got lucky with not having to wean him. Sandler had a bottle at night until he was about 15 months old. Now, he still has a cup of milk before he goes to bed. The Nuby cups are a good transitional cup because they have the softer spout.
I don't have a schedule for the boys. Well, somewhat I guess. Sandler will fall asleep for his nap somewhere between 1:00-3:00, it just depends on how well he slept the night before, and if I'm out running errands he just might fall asleep in the car a little earlier.
I'm a go-with-the-flow kind of person, that I want my kids to be flexible as well and not freak out or be crabby if we have a day where we would do different stuff than normal.
I'm sorry, I'm probably not much help, but I take the relaxed approach to motherhood and trust my instincts.
Hope you don’t mind my lurking . . . I’ve found it interesting to see what other “real people’s” schedules are. First – I’ll say to just trust your instincts. No one knows what’s best for your baby more than you! But I’ll give my two cents too:
1. when should he be off the bottle? Should I let him decide?
I’d say to try to start encouraging moving him from the bottle around 12 months. I’m a pretty “gentle” mom . . . I might start putting something he likes in a sippy, and just water in is bottle. Then let him decide what he wants more (does he want the favorite drink more, or just the comfort of a nipple).
2. Is it bad that he is having "Milk bottles" instead of water or juice in the bottle for naps and bedtime?
I really don’t know. I don’t understand why a bottle is so much different than a nipple (breast) either. I’m not a giant juice fan just because of the sugar content. Caedyn doesn’t like juice too much (she prefers water actually), so juice hasn’t been an issue for us.
3. When should he be able to go to sleep on his own without a bottle?
I’m too new of a mom to know.
4. Do you guys have a schedule set in place -with naps, getting up for the day, baths, food?
My little one (15 months) goes to daycare all day – so we do have a schedule.
Here’s ours:
6:30-7:30: wake up, diaper change, nurse, diaper change again, get dressed, go to “school”
8:00 – drop off at school. She gets an AM snack (currently chocolate milk in a sippy and something else) when she gets to school. We’ve been having a really hard time transitioning her to cows milk – she just doesn’t like it. After about a month of offering chocolate milk, she’s starting to drink it. I plan to slowly reduce the amount of chocolate in the mixture – but we haven’t gotten that far yet.
10:00 – she gets a bottle of breastmilk. She’ll only drink breastmilk in a bottle for some reason and absolutely refuses it in a sippy cup. I’ve got about another month’s worth of breastmilk frozen, so once she finishes it, there’ll be no more. I gave up on trying to get her to take it from a sippy cup (and I don’t want it to go to waste).
11:00 – 12:00 lunch (with water or chocolate milk if there’s some leftover from the morning)
12:30 – 2:00 nap (she usually sleeps about an hour an a half)
2:00 – another bottle of breastmilk and snack
5:00 – snack – and go home! She nurses again as soon as we get home
6:30ish – dinner
7:30ish - bath
8:00 – bedtime routine. She still nurses to sleep.
This is a late comment but I couldn't help it even though I'm not a mom. Bottles with milk before/while going to bed are really not good for your baby's teeth. Leading cause of baby bottle tooth decay. I've seen some bad pics. Juice is the same. I would say water to bed or be prepared to wipe out Cayden's mouth/brush his teeth while he's sleeping. Sorry I'm such a dental hygienist...
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