Sterilising bottles

[ThedementedPenguin]

My ds is nearly 5 months old and has been putting everything into his mouth for about a month. Which got me thinking about his bottles.

If you ff your baby when did you stop sterilising bottles? I don't want to know what guidelines say I just want parents to tell me when they stopped and if they had any particular reason for stopping?

I stopped at six months. As you say, what's the point when they will stick anything including the cat's tail in their mouth?! Some do it for years tough.

Yes that's what I'm thinking. I'm still currently doing it but just was thinking why? Surely the fact he's grabbing everything and putting it into his mouth is worse than bottles cleaned extremely well but not sterilised.

I stopped at 6 months round about the same time my steriliser broke. Shove everything in the dishwasher now. Although be warned some bottles have turned pink and Tommee Tippee closer to nature purple bit in the middle gets mashed up and leaks. Hey ho

I am ashamed to say after four DC I didn't realise until today you were supposed to sterilise past 6 months

Only DS1 has had bottles before 6 months and I did sterilise his but was a bit hit and miss with leaving them in too long, for the others I just give them a really good scrub in nearly too hot for hands hot water then put them in the dishwasher.

Does anyone know what the guidelines are?

It says up to a year.

www.babycentre.co.uk/a554982/sterilising-bottle-feeding-equipment

I just did it for six months. Once dd started licking the cat, it seemed futile.

The reason the advice is 12 months is due to the germs in formula (stuff like E-Coli has been found in there!) so not just the same as baby gets from licking the cat :) and can be fatal in little ones!

We stopped around 8 months, but would have carried on longer if it wasn't for using the dishwasher to wash the bottles as the top shelf is hot enough to sterilise anyway (doesn't stay sterile once you've opened the door, but will kill old formula germs).