Hi moms!
My daughter is almost 7 months old and I think she's a healthy weight and thriving. She started solids a couple weeks ago and can't get enough. She loves them! At daycare and with the sitter at home (she's with a sitter while my husband teleworks), she refuses to take a bottle, even with a sippy cup top. The daycare tries and tries, but she'll only eat solids. They're giving her solids three times a day, adding an ounce of milk each time. She'll take maybe a total of 4 ounces throughout the rest of the day at daycare, which means that from the time I leave her at 6am until I see her at night around 8pm, she's getting a grand total of maybe 7 ounces of milk in 14 hours. That can't be good.
This has been going on for a couple months. She's growing just fine and seems happy otherwise.
She nurses like crazy all night and when I'm home with her 3-4 days a week, probably to make up for not taking much milk during the day.
I'd rather not give her more than two servings of solids each day right now, and I'd love it if I could feed her solids when I get home at night, but it's more important to me that she eat during the day.
Any ideas for getting her back into the bottles?
Thanks, mommas!
She might be getting too many solids. Try the milk in a cup or sippie. We love the Tommie Tippie brand.
In my honest opinion, and it's only mine so take it with a grain of salt...she is getting WAY too much food. Formula is all the nutrition she needs at this age. Baby food and table food at this age is for teaching her to chew and swallow, not for nutritional value. If they only give her a few bites after taking the bottle she may get so hungry shell take it first.
The food has to be cut way down or she will be undernourished. Look at the label of the baby food, it has very little value. It is a supplement not her food. Her formula is her food.
Have them give the bottle first. Then 30 minutes later, the solids. If you need them to cut back on solids for awhile, then do. She won't starve herself.
When my son was 9 months old I had to travel for work. He did the same thing only to my husband. We had daycare feed him RIGHT as he got there and RIGHT before he left and then he only ate solids at night. It is a power struggle thing.
It sounds to me like it's time for cups. My grandson likes to drink water from a cup. He sips from normal cups through out the day when his mom gives it to him.
There's actually quite a bit of water in the baby food and in most foods. It could be great to encourage small diced up water melon, other watery fruits like sliced grapes, etc. This way the baby is getting more fluids.
It's not really an age that you want to force more bottles if the baby is getting away from them. The next few months will go by and then you'll be trying to break the baby from bottle and breast. That doesn't sound fun to me.
Have you tried a cup without a sippy lid? Just a regular cup? That helped a friend of mine. Or you could try a sippy cup with a straw or a flip top or a water bottle spout. There's many options aside from the typical sippy cup.
When I worked in day care, I had babies that did the same thing yours is doing and their mamas said sippy cup or nothing, so they had nothing but solids all day like your baby. The only one I had any success with was the one I used a medicine cup to give little bits of breast milk in. (She was only 2 months old.) She would take it, but NO bottles.
Wish you the best!
S. in TX
Breast milk or formula should be her primary nutrition, not solids, therefore if I were in your shoes I would pump more at home and bottle feed her. I wouldn't bottle feed her all the time at home but give her a bottle once or twice instead of breastfeeding to get her used to the bottle. I know it's a pain because you'd have to pump more but it's necessary to get her more used to the bottle so that she drinks the breast milk when at daycare.
Hi S., I am going through the exact same thing with my son...he's 7 1/2 months old...we have tried everything! he seems to take the bottle for us but not daycare....the worst thing they can do is to try to force a bottle on her...this is per my pediatrician as babies can build up such an aversion to the bottle (which I think my son has done by them trying to get the bottle in him for months) that he cries at the simple sight of a bottle...again, he does this only at daycare...finally now, I got them to do what your daycare is doing by adding formula to the oatmeal and his veggies...I have also asked them to just try to skip the bottle and try to at least get 2-3 ounces through cups during his feeding times....believe it or not, he has taken up to 5 oz this way...they start with a sippy cup (this actually gets him practicing drinking from the sippy)...if he doesn't want that or gets bored with it, they actually use very small plastic cups....they are very surprised how well he does drinking from them...and by drinking I mean taking sips at a time with them holding the cup...they control the amount he's taking in to make sure he doesn't choke, etc....at least this is better than nothing...my son is only drinking 18-24 oz per day and is very healthy and happy otherwise...think of it this way also, soon they will be moving away from a bottle and to the sippy / cups....so I gave up worrying about him always drinking his formula from a bottle...he does it for us at home but he drinks from cups at daycare, whatever it takes...
good luck!
yes. plain and simple your daycare and sitter need to cut back on the solids. She should be getting a bottle before getting any solids. Discuss with your daycare that you don't want her having that much solid foods while she is there and that she should be given her bottle first before any solid foods.
