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 Ask Dr. Jana
A 13-Month-Old Who Devours Bottle after Bottle | | | QUESTION | | | Dear Dr. Jana,
We have a 13-month-old boy who is devouring bottle after bottle! When and how are we supposed to try to wean him off the bottle? Thank you for any help.— Bo in Maryville, TN | | | ANSWER |
February 20, 2001 | | | Dear Bo,
In general, I recommend that parents try to set the goal of weaning their children from bottles sometime around 15 months of age. Some toddlers, however, are more than willing and able to wean months sooner.
By your description, your son sounds as if he drinks a lot from his bottles. For parents who are used to giving their infants 20-32 ounces a day from the bottle, the first step in transitioning is often just to realize that children don't need to drink as much once they are eating more solid foods and drinking whole (or two percent) milk. In general, if a child over the age of one year can drink somewhere in the vicinity of 16 ounces of milk a day from a cup, then they don't need to continue drinking from a bottle.
You can start the weaning process by simply offering your son a cup instead of a bottle, and/or offering him solid foods before a bottle (if he is consuming a lot more milk than necessary). Many toddlers are not as attached to their bottles as their parents might think and simply drink from them out of habit. When offered a cup, they are more than willing to take it.
Then there are the toddlers who are only attached to getting a bottle at a particular time of day --usually the morning or nighttime bottle. If this is the case with your son, start by getting rid of all the other bottles first.
If a child is particularly attached to his bottles, some people feel the "cold turkey" approach to weaning is appropriate, while others recommend decreasing the number of ounces offered in each bottle gradually over time. While I don't feel that one way is far better than the other, I tend to lean towards going cold turkey--it just seems to work better for many children. — by Laura Jana, M.D., F.A.A.P. |
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