Moving / getting rid of a bedtime feed

[essexlemon]

Hi all,

I've had a lot of help from Anna with sleep training my 13 month old DS recently (WIWO has been working wonders) but I've been guilty of keeping a bedtime feed although he doesn't go to sleep on that now (we do tea, long bath time, milk feed with a story, same story again and a snuggle, bed) which has been working great except that he has had a horrendous tummy bug which has meant nothing but water for a couple of days.

The whole thing has been so horrible, as he is really hungry AND can't sleep without that link in his bedtime routine and no amount of APOP has helped - he really DOES settle better in his cot now than in my arms / buggy / car etc (I never thought I would say that  )  It's basically made up my mind that I need to get that feed away from bedtime but I'm not sure how to go about it.

Am I best to reduce the amount of formula / water ratio in the bottle and gradually turn it into a drink of water before bed, or just wipe out the feed altogether and put up with hell for a week or so.  Also, should I be looking to get rid of that feed altogether, or should I be moving it elsewhere in the day.  I don't know if it makes a difference but he was BF until 10 months, then half and half to 12 months, then a couple of weeks ago we went to FF only.  He's fine with a bottle - the weaning was mainly for Mummy 

His feeds currently are:

7am - milk (7oz)
8.30ish - solid breakfast
10 - snack if grumpy
11am - milk (pre-nap feed) 7oz
2ish (depending on wake time) - solid lunch
3.30 - small snack
4.30 - solid tea
5.30 ish - milk (7oz)

I'm worried that if I move the bedtime feed earlier it will clash with his tea, but he is such a hungry boy that I don't know if we can knock it on the head yet.

Am I just worrying over nothing?  He does sleep really well on our current regime and I know I'd have to be really unlucky to have another bought of stomach plague, but...

Any advice much appreciated.

[Lolly]

DS didn't drop his bedtime feed until he was about 2.5 - it was part of our routine too so I was happy to keep it. He dropped his morning bottle around 18 months. He was really attached to his bottle at bedtime and we did try a few times to get rid of it but he was very resistant on previous atempts so we let him lead us.

Most toddlers seem to have the morning and bedtime bottle/ milk in a sippy between 1 year and maybe 18 months at least. From 1 year they only need around 12oz of dairy to get the calcium they need and that includes what is in food. Your LO is having a fair amount of milk in a day and to be honest I would probably keep the bedtime bottle and drop the day one instead. You could offer a snack instead of that bottle and milk in a sippy with meals if you choose.

I will move this over to eating for toddlers too!

Laura

[essexlemon]

Thanks Laura.

TBH the main reason I was thinking of dropping it was so that we didn't have so much trouble getting him to sleep if ever we have another bad tummy bug.

Having spoken to another doctor today I think we will leave the bedtime bottle where it is.

I might start looking at giving him some milk with his lunch, although tbh he really likes to drink water out of his sippy cup so I'm not sure how he will react.  I'll give it a go once he is fighting fit.

Thanks

[firsttimemummy]

We just went cold turkey with bedtime feed around 13 months. DS was breastfed and was reducing his milk intake at the bedtime feed anyway.  I got DH to put DS to bed and I kept out the way for a couple of weeks (At bedtime only, of course!) to break the routine.  We changed from having milk after the bedtime story to blowing off the light instead so he still had something after his story! He never missed the milk and still woke at the same time so clearly didn't miss the feed.