Graduating to Cows Milk from Formula

I would give her whole milk. She will need all the nutrients and vitamins from whole milk. 2% milk doesnt have all of it.

This was recommended by my pediatrician and worked smoothly for all my kids. Formula until 1, whole milk until age 2, 2% until age 3, skim milk like the rest of the family starting at age 3. That was a nice relief to only have to keep one kind of milk at home.

HI! Don't do cow's milk-they process it too much and it will screw up their hormones...try Goats Milk-do some research on line...be sure to put vitamins in there too. Good Luck.

As your Dr. will tell you, she should transition to whole mile for at least one year, they need the fat in it for proper digestion. However, for the first week or so, cut it in half with water, or her old formula, then go to whole milk.

We didn't transition with our daughter. The day of her 1st birthday, we gave her whole milk and she didn't even think twice about it. She loves it. The doctor said that it's not necessary to 'transition' them if they take to it right away. Now, if your daughter doesn't want it, then it might be something that you'll have to work with her on. But I would just give it to her and see if she objects. If she doesn't, you're all done with formula. :)

K.,
My daughter is 13 mon. We just switched from formula to cows milk. We first started with 2% because I didn't want to buy two different milks... until speaking to our pediatrician. I thought the fat in whole milk was to add weight, however the fat is for brain development. We switched. We began with 4 oz of milk in the morning, formula the rest of the time. Which was actually just at bedtime. She went down to one formula bottle a day, bedtime, 8oz. So milk in the morning, water/juice at lunch and in between, then add another 4 oz of milk at dinner (eventually, after tolerating the milk at breakfast,) then formula at bedtime. Our pediatrician said that babies do not need as much milk as we think, just three small glasses probably about 12 oz a day. We just stopped with the bottle/formula at bedtime. She misses it but it isn't stopping her from going to sleep and she doesn't seem to be hungery. We offer her water...we don't drink juice. Anyhow, just start with one glass of milk in the morning then add lunch and dinner and other drinks in between. Also, our daughter didn't like the taste of the whole milk but she did the 2%. I heard a number of things. We try to go with the healthiest. Add formula, which to me defeats the purpose of weaning off the formula, but now that I think about it, it would probably help with the digestion issues of whole milk. You would slowly decrease the formula. I am just kind of an "all or nothing" mom and I tend to just go for it, that being said our daughter had diarrhea for a few days in the beginning. I just refused to buy another container of formula. We also heard you can add carnation mix with the milk for taste. I am not so sure about this, I don't want her demanding chocolate milk... and don't know how much sugar is in the mix. I add a few spoons of strawberry yogurt and mix, she loves it. We already keep it so it's not something extra that I have to buy. Any pureed fruit would work, just a small amount for flavor. This may be unconventional and maybe not pediatrician approved, but in small amounts. I drink ensure and muscle milk, both low in sugar and high in protein and I have added both, a few tablespoons to her milk. They come in 3 or 4 flavors and we don't have to buy anything special since we have it on hand. Hope that helps.
Christine

My Dr. had me go to whole milk when my daughter turned 1.

I just read in an early childhood education publication that said that the majority of 12 month olds should go to whole milk for the fat content. BUT if your child is in the higher percentage for weight (over 75th%), you have a family history of obesity, high blood pressure or cholestorel disease then you should instead start them on 2%. If there are none of those risk factors then they should go to whole milk.

Hope that helps!

Hi, K.! Echoing the others: whole is the way to go for the next year or so. I actually just switched my kid all the way between her morning and even bottles. If your daughter doesn't like the milk, you can mix, but my pediatrician said there was no reason not to just switch, so we did, and everything was fine!

when we transitioned, we did it slow start with 1 oz milk, rest formula and then gradually go up week by week... it really did work... this was recommended by my son's (at the time) daycare teacher. This helps their tummy and body to get used to it because they say sometime if you just start with the whole milk at once, the child might get diareah. yes whole milk is best.

From what I've been told, you should do whole milk until your baby is 2, then you can switch to 2% if you want. We were able to make both transitions smoothly.

You can start the transition now. Go with whole milk because they need the fat.

They are supposed to have whole milk when they transition to milk. What I did is start out 3/4 formula and 1/4 milk, then week 2 I did 1/2 and 1/2, week 3 3/4 milk and 1/4 formula and then all milk. It worked well for me with both my daughters.

Hi K. call your daughter peditrican. He/she will know what's best to give her.

My daughter was on formula as well. Our pediatrician had us transition by trying out yogurt (vanilla mixed with her pureed fruits) first and when we knew that was tolerated, we tried cheese. Since she did great with both of those, we could switch to whole milk at 12 months.
We were told that because of how they are made, yogurt and cheese are easier to digest and introducing those first would help her little tummy get used to the whole milk.
Hope this helps!

Hi K.!

At 1 years old, babies need the fat so they need to be on whole milk. My son who is 13 months old didn't like the taste of milk at first, so I mixed the milk with the formula. I started off with 5 oz of formula and 2.5 oz of milk and slowly decreased the formula. It took about a week for him to get use to the new taste.

Good luck!

Kids do need to fat for development. I started adding milk to the few formula bottles my d got--she was mostly BF but my production got really low so I supplemented. Anyway, she hated formula. At around 9 months I would add just a bit of milk to her bottles. I used the 2 % since I didn't want to waste $$ on a full gallon of whole milk. Now she does only get the whole but when I run out, she sometimes does end up with the 2%. The doc says as long as she usually gets the other, about 16 to 22 ounces a day, she should be fine. I know a lot of people that usually take the route of slowing increasing the proportion of milk to formula and it works out well.