Hi ladies,
Hoping I can ask for your usual great help. We went for our 15 month ped visit this past week and he said I should start weaning DS from the bottle now so that he is off of it by 15 months. DS was late to start even using a sippy cup and even now he doesn't love it. I introduced it early, but TBH, he is very stubborn and I probably didn't push it as much as I should have, although I always kept it around. It is really only in the past month that he has started drinking water and juice from it after meals (although I did stop both of those liquids in the bottle a long time ago).
He has never been one to drink a huge bottle, so he is on 3 --one when he wakes up, one mid morning, and one late afternoon. He doesn't want one before bed so I guess that is good. Anyway, the ped has recommended watering down the bottles all at once and starting to give him milk in his sippy. I started doing that with his mid morning bottle. However, he seems to really hate the idea of milk in his cup. Every time I try to give it to him, I have to put it in his mouth so he'll taste it, and when he does, he makes a horrible face like I'm trying to poison him and cries. The ped wants him to still be drinking about 16oz/day (but I think he gives the upper end of the appropriate range just to be safe), but I have no idea how this will happen when he is really resisting milk in the sippy. TBH he doesn't even really love drinking water from his sippy, but I have worked hard to get him to at least sip it.
At the same time, I think he is ready to wean because he has not been taking a full bottle at each sitting for the past few weeks. He will drink it, stop, then want it a little again, etc. To me, that means that he wants to drink like a regular person (unless it is hurting his gums from his teeth).
Can you help me come up with an explicit plan so I can get this to work? His morning and late afternoon bottles are 6oz each and the mid morning one is 4 oz.
I am grateful for your help!
xx
Nicole