Taking off the Bottle

Dear S.,

Maybe rock him to sleep with a sippy cup near by if he wants a drink, warm milk, water, or whatever you choose. No bottle to go to sleep with. C. N. and Susan A.

you can try one of two ways...COLD turkey which will be hell for about 3-5 days, but then u r all done. Or you can try the slow weaning method. Make sure that the meal before nap and bed time is nice and full and he gets plenty. Then for two or three days he gets a full 8 ounce bottle. Then 6 ounces for 3 days, then 4 ounces, then 2, then none. This may work, may not. I've heard raves about both methods. Also, does your son use a sippy cup or pacifier? Usually the breaking of the bottle is hard because sucking is such a great comfort for infants and toddlers. So find somthing to replace it with. My mom bought me a binky buddy, but you could easily make one for the bottle. It was a stuffed animal with a string attached to it that the binky was attached to for nap and night time. That way my son associated the animal with the binky so we were able to wean him easily because he still got comfort from the animal once the binky was gone. You could have a special animal that goes to bed with him every single time at the same time that you start dropping the ounces off the bottle. That way when the bottle is empty the animal will still be there....see if that helps. :)

i would just say make sure to give him water at night in the bottle. Even if he cries its worth it. I went through the same thing and now my son has 8 cavities. He will be having surgery on the 24th. I didnt use the floride drops like suggested but he didnt stop going to sleep with his bottle until recently hes 2 1/2 anyway, I know its also genetics because I had some silver caps when I was a kid. But better safe then sorry. Its more for comfort. and we as parent need the rest at night so rather then fight we just give in. But I can tell you its not worth it at all. Im worried about the anestesia and I would not want any other mom to go through this. Whats worse is you cant even see the cavities. i took him in for a regular check up. Ive had 2 different opnions just to makek sure. So I know its hard but try to take him off and if anything use water. I hope this helps

Try giving him plain water only and maybe only 1/2 or 3/4 of the bottle. Offer a "treat" drink in a regular cup before naptime to encourage him to transition.

Hi, when we wanted our son to stop drinking from a bottle, we switched to a sippy cup...have you tried this? You might have to endure a few days or a week (give or take) of protests, but just hang in there & be consistent, he'll eventually get it that bottle time is over. We also talked to our son a lot about it, & told him he isn't a baby anymore, and sometimes use stickers as rewards when he does things he is initially resistant to.

Good luck!

Hi S., I will just tell you what our doctor told us about the bottle thing. Just take them away completly. It was 2-3 days of throwing a leak-proof cup but now it is not a problem. My son turned 12 months 2 week ago and he hasen't seen a bottle since he got home from his 12 month check-up. We came home, packed them up and through them in the garage. Your gonna have some kind of crying for his comfort toy which in this case is his bottle. My son was the same way but it was alot easier to just take them away completly rather then weening the child off because they tend to hold on tighter the more you slowly pull away. The old sayin applies here. "Out of Sight,out of mind." We tryed weening my 3 year old off a bottle like you and lets just say it was a couple of months of trantrums and many other crying issues. The earlier and quicker the better and faster the child can recover and move on. Save with a pacifier. I hope I was of some help. Good luck!

We started by watering down the formula, and putting less and less in there, and then went to just water. After my daughter being used to that, I found these juices at Target with character tops - they work very much like a bottle where you have to suck to get the juice, but they don't leak unlike every other sippy cup I've ever had. The great things about these is they are reusable - during the day my daughter would have some juice, then I would wash them and just use them for water in bed at night. My husband remembers not being allowed to drink water at night even though he was really thirsty, so he's big on making sure our daughter has some. Now, she's just happy if they are in bed (yes, she insists on having all four different ones), but rarely drinks at night (99% of the time she wakes up with dry pull ups).

Good luck!

Hi! My son is almost 1 and off the bottle. If you got through the day weaning, night should be a breeze. What I did was for a couple of nights he only had about 2oz of water in the bottle. Then I cave him a cup with about 3 or 4 oz of formula for 2 or 3 nights (Be sure to brush before and after sleep times to prevent erosion) then we went to 2oz of water in his cup. Slowly he just didn't mess with it anymore. Now he's nigh nigh baby with nothing but his blankets.
There was quite a bit of a fit at first but he got used to the cup pretty quick with the formula in it. (We tried to just put water in a first..no go..the formula was almost like a treat so he wasn't thinkin much about the bottle) I think going to water in the bottle was the hardest part of the entire process. Once you have that down, the rest should fall in place! ;)

Good Luck.. Feel free to email me if you want!!
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