Trying to get lo to bottle/cup feed at eight months

[Jesse]

Hi there I'm hoping someone out there can give me some advise.

My lo is exclusively breastfed. I did introduce a bottle months ago which she used to take but I think I didn't offer her it often ( bad mommy!) enough so she eventually refused. This was before she was three months old.

She's now 8.5 months old and I'm due to start back at work in six weeks, and I need her to take the bottle. I have experimented with different bottles and teats, and trainer cups (she uses a cup to drink water) but always she refuses it when she realises there's milk in it and gets very upset. I have offered her the bottle at different times of the day, and in different positions, I've got hubby to try and give it to her to no avail. I'm not sure how I should proceed.

Should I refuse all breastfeeds until she accepts the cup. This seems abit cruel to me and I'd rather do anything but! Any suggestions?

[RachelC]

I don't know if you have seen this, but perhaps it can help

https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=9215.0;topicseen

~Rachel

[Carter'sMama]

Hi there!

It is always tricky to get your lo to start taking a bottle or sippy cup for that matter.  To this day Carter will not drink anything but milk out of a sippy!  To get him to take the bottle though I just kept offering it to him.   It seemed that once he realized that it was milk in it he would drink it.  It took a few weeks but he would eventually give in.

You still have 6 weeks left so I wouldn't do anything extreme yet.  Keep offering the bottle or sippy and see what happens.  If you don't seem stressed out about it then your lo is more likely to take it.  When I was first trying to drop bfeeds and offer the bottle someone on here told me that it took them 5 weeks of offering the bottle before every bf for their lo to take it.  Some babies have temperature preferences as well.  My guy will only drink out of  a bottle if it is very warm.

HTH

[Jesse]

Hi Cater's Mama, thanks for your advice. I'll keep offering it to her and see if we make any progress. Can you tell me whether you gave your lo expressed milk or formula - did it make a difference. Thanks.

[Carter'sMama]

I actually had been giving my guy a bottle of expressed milk every night since he was 6 weeks old.  When I had to try and get him onto soy milk (at about 10 months of age) is when I had the most problems.  I did try formula but he just wouldn't get used to it.  He now happily drinks out of the bottle for 2 feeds a day. 

I started dropping feeds and adjusting to the bottle of soy milk right about 3 weeks before I went back to work.  I never got to the point where I had to withhold bf to get him to take the bottle.  I wish he would have taken it out of his sippy cup rather than the bottle but I am still working on that.  I am currently mixing half soy milk with half water in his sippy to gradually adjust him to it.  This is what I did when I was switching him to soy milk in the first place.  I started with 3/4 ebm and 1/4 soy then 1/2 and 1/2 then 3/4 soy and 1/4 ebm.  I only took maybe 5 days to switch him over competely.  I don't know if that system would work for your lo (mix ebm and water to get her used to ebm/formula out of a sippy).  Just a thought! 

Let us know how it goes!