Little confused about milk intake for 16.5 month old

[scucci1979]

On a normal day, Madison drinks between 14-16ozs, plus yogurt and cheese.  Today, she surprised me and ate a well balanced dinner. When it came to her bedtime bottle she only drank 4ozs. I assume she was full from dinner.  Today's total amount of milk intake was 10ozs.  I am wondering how much milk should los be drinking at this age?

[*Becky*]

Hi Sabs,
Following along. DS drinks the same amount as Madi and I am wondering whether I should start to decrease it a little. i think the guidelines are between 12-16 oz - something like that. Hopefully someone will let us know xxx

[Mashi]

There are actually NO milk requirements for toddlers at this age.  There are calcium requirements, but that does not mean that it has to come from milk.

From about 1-3 years old toddlers need 500mg of calcium per day. There is about 300mg of calcium in 250 mls of milk (about 8 ounces) -- so that works out to needing 12ish ounces of milk per day to meet calcium requirements, but any other calcium containing foods can be substituted.   

Too much calcium interferes with iron absorption so it is something to keep an eye on.

Here are some other calcium sources:
Milk, whole or low-fat     1 cup     300 mg
Soy or Rice Milk    1 cup    300 mg
White beans    1/2 cup    113 mg
Instant Oatmeal    1 cup    100 mg
Broccoli, cooked    1/2 cup    35 mg
Broccoli, raw    1 cup    35 mg
Cheddar cheese    1.5 oz    300 mg
Yogurt, low-fat    8 oz    300 mg
Orange juice, calcium fortified    1 cup    350 mg
Orange, medium    1    40-50 mg
Sweet potatoes, mashed    1/2 cup    44 mg

[scucci1979]

Great! That was helpful! 

[*Becky*]

Thanks
Bit worried DS has too much calcium now???

[*Liz*]

Don't worry about too much - if they have a little too much in the system they will just get rid of it  .

Dietary intake of most vitamins and minerals is pretty hard to overdose on - problems mainly come from VERY restricted diets or from high doses in multivitamins. For example - eating nothing but carrots all day could give you a bit of bother with Vit A  .

[*Becky*]

oh ok - thanks Liz