Should I drop to 3 bottles?

[tachaorama]

Hello,

My son is now 7.5 months old. His routine looks like this:

Wakes around 6:30/7am
7am: Bottle
8am: solids
10/10:30a nap (usually 1.5 to 2 hrs)

11:30a/12p: bottle
12:30p: solids
3/3:30p nap (usually about an hour)

4/4:30 bottle
5:30/6 solids

We start bed time around 7pm. We do bath, jammies, bottle (normally by 7:20p he's eating), two stories, sing our good night song and in bed. He's usually asleep by 7:45/8p.

He is STTN and has been for a few months. His 3rd bottle was 6 oz, but now he maybe eats 4 oz. 4th bottle (bed time) was 8oz, but now only eats 6oz. And  both bottles it takes some convincing to get him to eat at all. When he wakes in the morning he doesn't down his first bottle like he's starving, he usually leaves like 1/2 an oz.

So I have tried tweaking his solid amounts (I know formula should be his main food still at this age), and when I give them to him. No difference. I tried giving him the 3rd bottle before his second nap and he flat out refuses it.

So my question is, do you think he is trying to tell me he's ready to go to 3 bottles a day? He usually takes in 24-26 oz of formula a day. I'm wondering if I push his 2nd bottle to 1ish, if he'd eat 8oz, and then eat another 8oz at bed time. Essentially have three 8 oz bottles a day, instead of four 6 oz bottles? Plus the extra 1-2 oz that is mixed into his solids.

What do you think? I just hate fighting with him and constantly having to offer his bottle over the course of an hour trying to get him to eat.  I feel like doing that isn't really following his cues at all and that I am trying to override him.

[creations]

Sounds like he's ready or almost ready to drop 1 milk feed. Like you have said the remaining 3 bottles may increase when you do this. However, I prob wouldn't move any of his bottles (if you move the second bottle to 1pm this is after his solids lunch which means he may not be hungry enough to take the milk) but instead I would switch one bottle (either mid morning or mid afternoon) for a small snack with a sippy cup of water.
So long as his milk intake (bottles and dairy solids such as cheese) are basically stable then I see no problem.

Also going to move you over to bottle feeding as this is essentially about dropping bottles

[tachaorama]

Ah, okay. I think the 3rd bottle is the "problem bottle" for us. He doesn't want it when he used to. And ends up having it a few hours before his last bottle. So then he's not hungry for his bed time bottle. I'll try making that into a snack and see how it affects things.

And thank you for moving me! I wasn't sure if I had posted it in the right place.

[creations]

No problem