would you say it was a bad thing for a 4yo, 3yo and 22mo to go to sleep at night drinking from a bottle?

[BeautifulBoysGalore]

ds1 - water (it was watered down juice for a while till his teeth scared me and i finally managed to convince him to take water for that reason a few omnths ago.)
ds2 - milk
ds3 - really watered down juice (well, less watered down tonight to mask the flavour of his medicine as he has a chest infection)

theyve always gone to sleep drinking - bm till about 6m each, then bottles of follow-on formula till 12m, then cows milk (and onto juice for ds1 and 3 who dont like milk)

ds2 is die hard milk bottle lover. will cure ANY ill/hurt/sadness/overtiredness instantly. is it cruel to take that away?

do you think making them all take water would be a good way to cut it down (less incentive to drink, but still allowing the comfort of a suck)?

what about switching the bottles to smaller bottles?

they are too old for bottles, clearly. but is it bad enough to do anything about it?

BBG - no advice as my ds (3.8) still has a bottle every night and morning (all the time if he had his way tbh)

As long as you brush their teeth regularly etc and I wouldn't worry about it interfering with the development of their teeth.

I have no clue as to how to get him to give up but it makes him happy so I don't care at the end of the day.

do you brush teeth after the night one mercy?

thanks for words of comfort btw.

My DD1 4 and DD2 3 recently gave up bottles. (They never went to sleep with them, just evening and morning milk)
They put them in a bag in their bedroom for the bottle fairy to take for new babies.
In the morning they woke to a small gift from the fairy!

Worked a treat. Neither has asked for a bottle since.

No - it's the one that helps him go to sleep.

Dd is due for a check up pretty soon so I will ask the dentist (he has been once or twice with big sis and apparently all is well so far)

bottle fairies... hmmm, that might work...

Maybe bottle pirates for boys!

(they need the bottles to send messages in a bottle in the sea thrown off the pirate ship!)

water only

FWIW, my mother drank from a bottle until she was five.

she'd come home from school and her mother would stick a teat on a bottle of Coke and she'd drink it.

she's one of the most laid-back, well-adjusted people i've ever met.

Oh I am so glad I have read this.
DS is a total bottle addict on a night and at nap times.
I really want to stop it as he has to have it to go to bed and wakes up around 6am for another one and then has another 2 hour sleep.

Has anyone gone cold turkey?

nbg - you could make him a 'spare' and leave it somewhere he can easily find it in the dark... i di that for a while with ds1&2... only ds2 now drinks all of both right away (about 20oz of milk) to go to sleep and never keeps it for spare.
rod for own back comes to mind!!

mind you, i have to drag himout of bed in the morning these days, and v rare for night wakings for him...

thanks expat.

i think i will switch them to water only in bottles at night... with any drink of their choice downstairs beforehand...

hmmm, that night nanny is sure looking attractive right now

tort - i like your style btw...

there's enough stuff in parenting to get upset about without worrying about a bottle, BBG.

really, i mean, think of the grand scheme of things.

eventually, they will grow out of the bottles on their own.

but really, for their dental health, which is important in the grand scheme of things, i'd make it water only.

just not sure i can bring myself to remove both the drink and the medium at the same time... not for 3 at once. it'll be pandemonium!

or will it?

but doing 1 at a time wont work either, surely the one im working on will see the other/s having bottles/drinks and want them too??

[RUBBISH mummy]

expat, you are right.

thanks.

My dd1 is an aboslute bottle and dummie addict (she is 2.5). However it was getting to the point where she was constantly asking for milk in a bottle all day long ("teeny tiny bit mummy..."). On her second birthday she lay on the floor sobbing for it so I thought enoughs enough and said no more bottles in the day. We bought a sippy cup with a soft spout I called her sucky cup and thta was it. She was still aloud a bottle at night but she new that was it for the day time. We had less than a week of protest and that was that. Her nighttime bottle she has on the couch after a bath and good teeth clean, I then go over her teeth again quickly after, but if she falls asleep first I don't really stress.
She also used to wake in the night for milk but I stopped that at around 16 months by offering a bottle of water or a cup of milk. The bottle won and she slept with a bottle of water for a long time (can't remember how or why it stopped- probably the leaking nappies in the morning).

There is so much about parenting to make us feel guilty isn't there?

DS had formula in a bottle at night and in the morning till he was over 4. Had the bottle downstairs though so usually had teeth cleaned afterwards although I will admit to failing at that quite a bit. Cries of "Mummy i am just TOO tired" would work with me [weak mummy emoticon].

(It was hypo-allergenic formula as he was allergic to dairy for a while.)

We gave his bottles to Father Christmas and FC brought him an extra present. He asked for it for a week or so regularly and then less regularly and then that was it. Now he takes water to bed in a purple sports bottle that McDonalds gave out in Happy Meals (more guilt!!) in case he is thirsty. He doesn't usually drink any of it - he does it because DH and I both take a glass of water to bed.

With your scenario and with a younger child i would change the routine so that they have their drinks downstairs and then clean their teeth and take a bottle of water to bed if they are likely to be thirsty.

I don't think 19 month old Tom would care about what he actually drank at bedtime (would prefer booby) but my problem is other than a bottle or Doidy cup (that we have to hold for him), he won't drink out of anything else! We've tried allsorts of trainer cups, so I think we just need to wait until he can hold the Doidy without being tempted to throw it.

On another note: He's also only got his 4 front teeth through, so finds it hard chewing food. Although, he will take bites out of an apple, but spits alot of food out because it is lumpy. He was 13 months or so before he actually put something in his own mouth to eat!

My DD loved he bottle of milk at bedtime - had lots of other drinks out of cups, including milk at nursery - but would not give up her bottle of milk at bedtime. A cup of milk wouldn't do. A bottle of water wouldn't do. Told her when she was 4 (ie just before she started school) she'd have to give it up. DD = very stubborn child, had v little hope this'd work. warned her for months - and she did - overnight! And has NEVER drunk milk again. (Had to introduce the odd milkshake in the daytime to get her to have milk, and more yoghurts, to ensure she got dairy foods).

DS is going the same way - 3.5 - so we're hoping the same strategy will work, have started warning him now!

It's just such a comforting, integral part of the bedtime routine. And when we've tried cold turkey on this and other issues before it's been a DISASTER. eAch child is different. Stick to your instincts!

PS - I asked my dentist about the bottle of milk at night thing, she said not to worry, as long as they drank it all in one go and weren't sipping it all night long, and as long as I never gave anything except water or milk in a bottle, it wasn't somethingn to worry about.

thank you so much to everyone who has shared their experiences with me here. and for the advice and thought... thanks a lot.

My dd1 is nearly four and still loves a bottle of milk at bedtime. We tried to wean her off of it but she wanted juice instead so we decided milk is better. I brush her teeth before she drinks the milk and afterwards as well. And mornings.

She still has a sucking reflex and really loves milk. She really relaxes when drinking it. Her diet is quite good on the whole. I think the calcium in the milk can only be a good thing.

I think in your circumstance I would go for the water in bottle option. Or maybe milk in cup downstairs, then teeth, then bottle of water with story.

Mine teethed early and from then I did milk (even when still breastfeed), teeth, then story, then bed. A story has always really helped them settle. Or you could try soupy's songs method.

How about those funky anywayup cups full of water? They can ONLY have water in otherwise they will smell, or explode or something, and the bottles are broken.

Snip the teats off the bottles and demonstrate that they are BROKEN and it is because they are being used by big boys, not babies.

The anywayup cups don't spill at all, great in bed.

my ds's, nearly two and three still have milk in bottles in the morning and at night. I have tried giving them their milk in a sippy cup but they won't drink it.

last time i tried anywayupcups (and i have tried onand off for a numberof...years now) they were not impressed. none of them. coz you have to suck so hard. they just seem to piss them off. which is a shame as i think theyre great, what with the no-spilling and all. dss used to use them but i cant make my lot bite. sigh.

like belgo says, they get so much comfort from sucking. it really relaxes them. i need to be sure about taking that away before i do it.

maybe the comfort they get from bottles makes up for the shitness of my mothering. not that im over analysing this or anything

I have put DS who is 9 months on a beaker (Tommee Tippee free flowing but you can flip the spout in to stop it spilling) for daytime drinks - he has milk in a bottle on waking and when going to bed, but will get rid of these when he is 12 months or so.

I did it with DD - having tried every cup in Mothercare and any other shop that sold different beakers - she would not drink milk out of them - water and juice was fine. I think I kept confusing her - when I bought the cheapers (99p i think) free flow Tommee Tippee cup, she used that fine - must have cost me over £30 in beakers! the other one she liked was a Heinz Baby Basics beaker that had a soft tip and was narrow enough to get her hands round.

Ds doesnt seem too fussed as long as he gets a drink - little and often kind of guy!