wont hold bottle

[clare076]

My DD is almost 10 months old, and she wont hold her bottle. Is it asking too much to expect her to be holding it now? If I give her the bottle she leans forward and puts the teat in her mouth but wont pick the bottle up. If I lay her down to give her the bottle she either immediately relaxs her arms to the side or plays with her hair. She makes absolutely no attempt to feed herself.

I dont mind feeding her, but shouldn't I be encouraging her to do it herself. She wont use a sippy cup, I offer it everyday with a little juice but she uses it too hammer the table instead.

Any advice
Clare

[MrsKirky]

Clare, DS did this too.  I kept putting his hands on the bottle and "dropping" it.  It took a long time, but he finally did it himself.  I also kept trying different types of sippy cups.  I finally made it such that he would only get sippy cups (at one year).  The pediatrician also advised me at the one year appt (actually warned me - he has twin and 2 singles) to throw out ALL the bottles right away.  I did it that day!  It was a rough transition for those 2 months before the year b-day, but it worked.  Keep trying! 

BTW, we are now having trouble with regular cups.  He can drink from straws and sippy cups, but still likes to "tip it up" and spills regular open cups all over himself.  Sigh!

[clare076]

Was your LO already drinking out of sippy cups before you got rid of the bottle? I am a bit concerned getting rid of the bottle until she is at least taking some out of a cup. Today I gave her a small bottle of juice and just put it in front of her in the high chair. She did pick it up and put it in her mouth but didn't lift it up enough to get fluid out. Of course the first thing I did was take over, maybe it's my fault she isn't doing it herself. I might try tomorrow giving it too her and just waiting to see what she does.

[* Paula *]

Clare,

At 15 months my DS still will not hold his own bottle     I have tried on numerous ocassions and he just pulls it out of his mouth and hands it back to me to do.  I do persever, and then he gets angry.  I guess he will do it in his own time.

I would not worry too much about it at this stage. 

You are doing the right thing with the sippy.  I would keep on introducing it with juice / water etc, and help her when she wants a drink.  When meal time is over, you can always give her the cup on the floor to experiment with.  She will learn in her own time.

As for drinking milk out of a sippy - DS still does not want his milk in a sippy - we have kept on trying, but he still refuses only taking a few mouthfuls at a time. 

HTH

Paula x

[MrsKirky]

No, he was not drinking from the sippy cup well at the time.  I didn't do it until he was frustrated, but I took away his options after trying for a long time and he figured it out.  (I kept one sippy cup that had a nipple attachment just in case he couldn't figure it out.)  I felt kind of bad, but he figured it out so quickly that I wondered afterwards why I waited so long to do that!  The moral of the story is not to starve your child and give them no other options, but to give them a chance to figure it out.  I let him try to drink from the sippy cup while holding him as I did with the bottle, then showed him how to tip it back, then showed him where the milk came out, then squeezed it a little when he put it in his mouth.  He got it!