How many feeds question

[soniaweir]

MY DD is nearly 11 months and i give her 3 bottle feeds a day each of 7 oz but she never finishes the bottles. She takes her milk from NUK bottles but i want to get her onto avent bottles so that she will eventually hold the bottle herself. With the NUK they have to be the right way up. When i gve her the avent bottle she won't take any milk. I'm worried that she is not getting enough milk - in a day she usually has around 10oz in total - am i worrying unnecessarily?

thanks alls

I wouldnt bother trying to change bottles at this stage - why not offer some milk in a lidded cup instead, perhaps along with a snack and get her used to feeding herself milk from that instead. Neither of mine even fed themselves milk from a bottle but did get to the stage of drinking it out of a cup - dd was off bottles and having milk from a cup by 15 months and ds got to the same stage around 11 months.

Up to 1 year around 20oz is recommended but any milk in cereal, in foods/cooking, etc and any other dairy you give counts too e.g. yoghurt, cheese, etc so it doesnt all have to be in drink form. From 1 year the minimum drops to around 12oz inclusive of the above so I wouldnt be too worried about a lack of milk intake if you make it up through her food.

I would personally stick with the nuk bottle for the am and pm feed and offer the daytime one in a cup. When she takes more than a few sips from the cup then start to transfer the other feeds into the cup too.

thanks for the response! you are probably right. I was very lazy with the bottle with DS and he only stopped taking one at night when he was over 2 and that was because he hurt his mouth and could not suck.

will try afternoon milk with sippy cup.