When to drop the final BT bottle

[Skadiver13]

So DH and I have been going back and forth regarding the BT bottle. On one hand we feel he needs the calories since he's still on the smaller side and just doesn't eat much during the day. Also he just doesn't drink a lot during the day maybe 8oz if that. So another 8 oz from the bottle is helpful.  But  a few things. 1. we'll never get to PT train him if he's still drinking at night and 2. I think maybe the bottle is contributing to some gas issues at night?

When did everyone drop that BT feeding? DS is 22 months.

[Lindsay27]

We did around 18 months, but he pretty much dropped it on his own.  His fluid intake did pick up during the day.  I leave a cup of water in his crib if he gets thirsty in the night.

[Skadiver13]

See Liam will down the whole bottle if I let him. Even of its only 30-45 min after eating dinner sometimes if he had an exceptionally bug dinner hellstop and leave a few oz. My concern more is the calories and calcium since he cant have milk. I tried the formula in a sippy he wanted none of it.
 

[TB9]

DD1 was 25mo, we did it at the same time that she switched to a big girl bed.  We just told her big girls dont have bottles, and that was that!

[*Becky*]

Mine were earlier, prob around 15 months but they are both on the bigger side and we knew they did not need them...

[creations]

Just saw this.
Have you thought about shifting the milk to the morning instead of BT?
It was different for us because I decided to keep a large morning milk rather than the BT one. DS is also small but he can have cows milk.  I dropped the BT bottle at 12 months and the morning bottle at 13 months but for BT I gave a solids supper before bath and BT (and like you're saying about the BT milk even if he had just had a massive dinner he would go straight on to that supper plus a sippy of milk although it was a very small amount of milk in the early days and gradually increased). The morning milk I continued in a bottle but kept trying a straw in a bottle until he took it, there was no reduction in milk intake at all so I was happy he was getting it.
It does help to have larger drinks in the morning when it comes to PT and also at some point BT milk can lead to difficulty containing the night time wee in a nappy.
DS went dry at night gradually between 25 months and 32 months. I don't limit drinks in the evening but there's a difference between not limiting drinks and having a big BT milk. DS has water just before bed, usually a few sips but sometimes he'll have a good chug esp if he is poorly. Obviously for night dryness it's not just about the BT milk but I'm pretty sure we couldn't have gone dry if there was still a big milk drink at BT.
Have you looked into other calcium rich foods? Would that help you make a decision about dropping or moving the milk?
http://www.iofbonehealth.org/calcium-rich-foods

[Skadiver13]

Hey thanks. I know moving the milk in the morning will mean he wont have breakfast. He is a very small eater so I'm afraid that will affect his breakfast? It might be worth a shot to try.  He really does love his BT bottle as part of his routine so I know that's par tof it. He downs 9oz with out even thinking about it and that's usually only 45min or so after eating dinner.  He will not drink his formula out of a sippy cup I've tried multiple times. I honestly don't think it's the formula he wants but the bottle, but he still kinda needs the calories and calcium from the formula too.

Thanks for the link I'll definitely take a look. Only thing is I think he still needs the calories too as he's just not a great eater. He gets around 240calories from the bottle alone. For Calcium the recommendation here is 700mg per day. So I think this around what he gets.

1 piece of cheese 250mg
1/2  cup veggie pasta? Not sure couldn't find info on it 75mg maybe
3 oz coconut yogurt not sure of the mg possibly 100mg (25% daily value for an adult)
1 slice of whole wheat bread or raisin bread says 4% of daily value (for an adult)would be 40mg

He doesn't like fish, rarely eats much meat, for vegetable he has beets, peas, and carrots. He will occaisouly have hummus but not every day. Hates broccoli and spinach. Will try kiwi.

so with his bottle he gets more than that. See my dilemma?

[creations]

Yes I do see the dilemma. I know how worried I was at some point when DS suddenly dropped milk (it went up again a few weeks later) and i was trawling for calcium information. I wasn't *as* concerned about calorie intake but yes it still worried me that his fat intake went down too.
Mine also had his BT bottle as part of his routine and I worried his lovely BT routine would go to pot if I dropped it but I went really slowly (still less than 2 weeks) and not one single night/BT was disturbed. No crying, still totally settled to bed, never woke hungry. His morning milk gradually increased and later the sippy of milk at supper time increased. Our BT routine, cuddles, etc never appeared to change even though I gradually took that bottle out.
WRT not being hungry for breakfast - it would be the same amount of calories in the day wouldn't it, just moved? So yes breakfast might have to come later or might reduce to a tiny amount, but, you would introduce a solids supper instead of BT bottle which would make up for the breakfast 'loss'. In a way it's milk for breakfast and breakfast for supper - although he might take a breakfast on top of his milk and really surprise you.
Mine wouldn't take milk from a sippy either, it was about 10ml he took along with the solids supper when I started the wean, barely anything, our success was the straw rather than the sippy. And it was much later that he took more milk in a sippy (he now has a sippy milk in the morning rather than a straw but the rest of the day he has an open cup).

Is there a way you can add some of his formula to other foods?  Is it a powder? When I was concerned BWers suggested adding milk powder to other foods, such as in pancake mix etc, would you be able to add formula to the coconut yoghurt for example?
Also, mine never liked fish or meat either, it's another thing that has picked up slowly over a long time. But I did discover, amazingly, that although he didn't like 'fish' he would eat a fish finger, sprats (v v high in calcium) and now mussels. It might be worth trying some of the things on the calcium rich foods list, I honestly never thought a kid could eat sprats/whitebait - but he does - head, tail, the lot! (I now buy a pack of fresh sprats and freeze them in bags of 6 so when we have 'fish' he gets sprats, it's one of the few meals I will cook differently for him)

Obviously you need to do what you feel comfortable with. No pressure, I'm just sharing how it was for us in case any of it helps

[Mama2Athena]

Both mine were early - DS was "encouraged" to drop his at 15 months.  The transition took only maybe a week.  My DD dropped the BT bottle on her own at 11 months.  With dinner, she always got a sippy cup of milk and around  10.5 months she started drinking more milk at dinner and would hardly touch her BT bottle.  She is on the small side (5-10%) so I too was worried about calorie intake, so we encouraged her to have her morning bottle until 13 months.  We would have kept it longer but she was just not interested.   But then again, she was never really interested in the bottle - she's more interested in sucking her fingers! She'll be 2 tomorrow and I don't see her giving up her fingers anytime soon... LOL.

Does your LO drink from a straw cup?  I noticed that my DD will chug her milk if it's served in a straw cup, but will drink much less if in a sippy.  We haven't fully transition to a straw cup because she is so messy with it.

[Skadiver13]

Hi to you both. No my lo will not drink milk from a sippy cup, straw cup, or open cup he just isn't interested. when I say milk I mean his formula because he still can't tolerate cows milk. We've tried other forms of milk but he isn't interested in those ether.  He does like cheese but it can constipate him easily so we can't give it every day.

it would be the same amount of calories in the day wouldn't it, just moved?

Creations I see what you are saying about the morning bottle but he eats a full solids dinner AND drinks a full bottle at BT so i'm stil unsure the reasonsing to move it to the AM? It would diminish his breakfast and would essentially be lowering the amount of calories he takes not upping it?

I'm not worried about his routine so much as I think after a few days he'll forget about it he's pretty good with change but the longer we wait the harder I think that will be. I do think he generally really likes the bottle as he asks for it before BT so it may not be as easy as I think. But this is honestly the least of my worries as much as the calcium and fat intake of dropping it but on the other hand not being able to PT him because he still has it.

I will add some powder to his foods like his eggs which I make everymorning but we honesty,l can't keep that up as this formula is expensive and my income has dropped significantly.

What are fish finger sprats? Sorry not familiar with those? I think mussles might be a good try we'll see if he likes those.

[pinkladyangel]

Just seen this post.
Our lo is cows milk intolerant so he has oat milk. I'm pretty sure the calorie content is the same as cows milk.
Also he's 19 months and still has 7oz at bedtime.

[creations]

Creations I see what you are saying about the morning bottle but he eats a full solids dinner AND drinks a full bottle at BT so i'm stil unsure the reasonsing to move it to the AM? It would diminish his breakfast and would essentially be lowering the amount of calories he takes not upping it?

I meant that you would offer an additional solids meal in the evening (I call our evening meal 'dinner' and anything after that 'supper') so for instance instead of (times are just as an example)
dinner 5.30
BT milk 7pm
BT S 7.30
you would do
dinner 5.30
supper 6.15 (this could be whatever you usually offer for breakfast or any healthy solid food)
BT water bottle/cup

The times are different but this is basically what I did with DS. His BT milk was replaced with an additional solids meal even though he had just had a solids meal which was the family dinner. It started out that supper was about an hour after dinner but as BT moved for various reasons etc he would literally eat dinner, a full meal plus fruit for desert, then have supper immediately afterwards. Quite odd, but true. He did eventually drop supper but sometimes now likes to have a tiny cup of milk after dinner.


Fish fingers and sprats are 2 different things - and I've prob caused some confusion mentioning them both.
Fish fingers are usually white fish in a bread crumb which are oven baked, grilled, or fried, maybe you call them fish sticks?  I was able to buy a really good one although I dislike processed food I was keen to get DS on some sort of protein. I also put a lot of time into getting him on to home made fish fingers/sticks so I can use the fresh fish we are having for dinner but crumb and fry DS's.  Over time I've been able to get him to eat some fish that is not crumbed.
Sprats are very small fish, you toss the whole fish in flour then deep fry, because the bones are tiny and because they are fried they are crunchy and easily eaten.  Because you eat all the bones they are super high in calcium, DS doesn't bat an eye he eats the entire fish, head, eyes, tail, everything.  They are like white bait but smaller.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprat

Now the reason I think I caused confusion is that sprats are high in calcium but fish fingers/sticks and mussels are not (as far as I know).  I just meant that I have been super surprised by some of the things DS will eat (ie little fish that look like fish, mussels in shells rather than a small piece of anonymous salmon) and you might be surprised by something your DS will eat which you might not have tried from the calcium rich food list. I don't know, maybe tahini, canned sardines, or making fish paste (needs to be with bones) for sandwiches or kidney bean and chick pea burgers. It's just ideas...I always thought DS wouldn't eat broccoli but discovered he will eat the stems of long stemmed broccoli but not the flower head so he can get some calcium there.

If the milk powder is expensive maybe you can add some ground almonds to some things instead? Sorry don't know if he can have nuts and I don't know if you bake, you can use it in pancakes and muffins, sub in part for flour.

I think in your position I'd prob continue with the bottle. I do understand the worry of meeting his dietary needs and I'm always in awe of mums who cope with milk intolerant LOs, amazing actually.

[Skadiver13]

Thanks so muchm will reapond more just wanted to say he ate sardines straight from the can. lol

[creations]

Wow!
So you found a high calcium food he likes - that's brilliant! 
Personally don't understand how anyone can eat sardines, for me they are way too boney, even though I love most seafood.

I think canned salmon is also high calcium, again it needs to be with bones, I can't stand canned salmon, only like fresh, but it's worth a try if you can get hold of some.  Salmon paste on toast or sandwiches is quite nice though, maybe whizzing the bones makes it more palatable.

[tfuentes00]

My lo was right at 12 mths. She too is a small eater and only gets about 10 oz of cows milk a day. The dr actually suggested that but said to give her yogurt and Keifer as an alternative. She also put her on poly vi sol vitamins. Maybe you could slowly decrease the amount it the bottle until he has no more. And give him vitamins or maybe like a pedisure like drink during the day for the extra calories and calcuim.