Stopping breastfeeding at 10 months - formula or cow's milk? Cup or bottle?

[jocelyn4]

Hi,

I would love to hear if anyone has been in a similar position, I'm not necessarily looking for someone to advise me what to do.

So I have been exclusively breastfeeding for 10 months and now looking to phase it out (my baby is getting less keen anyway). I've had conflicting advice from health advisers, saying go straight to cow's milk as a drink, and others saying formula until a year. I know the general advice is a year, but it doesn't seem to make sense to do formula for just less than 2 months.

Whatever the choice I would probably go straight to a cup (my baby has never even had expressed milk from a bottle), unless it meant that he would drink significantly less than if he had a bottle. One worry with giving up feeding him is that he might struggle to keep hydrated.

Any thoughts would be appreciated, thanks!

I did this - my son went onto cow's milk between 10 and 11 months. He wasn't taking a bottle either, so he had a cup too. Always eaten well, but didn't drink much cow's milk until he was over 1, sometimes only a few ounces per day. Always offered 12 to 18 ounces per day, occasionally he'd drink it all. Now (16 months) he'll wolf down 9 ounces or so before bed. I think he could drink loads out of a cup before then but it's not done him any harm. If he was thirsty, he'd drink milk or water.

It's to do with vitamins apparently.... DS would never take a bottle so we just went straight onto cups, and now he will drain a tommee tippee first cup in about 3 minutes flat first thing in the morning. He is now a year old. I gave him a combination of cows milk and formula depending on what I had in the cupboard! Those one portion ready made ones are brilliant for when you're out and about!

I'm currently asking the same question! The lactation consultant I saw yesterday said not too much cows milk before 1 as it is too difficult for kidneys to process.

I stopped bf DD1 at 10mo and DD2 at 12mo. We did go straight to a cup with both, it was a few weeks of gradually introducing milk in a cup before they would drink the whole thing but they had not been used to bottles so there wasn't really a problem. I did do 2 months of formula with DD1 (you can give formula in a cup as long as you measure it accurately or use ready-made) but went straight to cows milk with DD2.

Thanks everyone, I'm glad I'm not the only one thinking about this... Just out of curiosity when a lot of you say 'cup' - do you mean an open one or a sippy one like the Tommee Tippee first cup?

Also, how much milk (formula/ cow's) do people generally give a 10 month old/ year old baby, and when in the day? Sorry if I sound really clueless! Finding it difficult to get my head round this for some reason.

Thanks

Did this with DD3 at similar age and went to formula and soft spout cup but always did tommee tippee hard spout cup for water

For me "cup" means Tommee Tippee free flow cup, that's what I went to rather than bottle for bf baby.

The only reason I can think of for not using formula as recommended under a year is if you have a bit of a stickler who won't like changing twice. If baby quite pliable, I'd do formula at this stage.

We still use the tommee tippee free flow ones-they're cheap as chips (£1.50 in tesco!) and have measurements up the side so you can mix formula in them

Thanks!

Sippy cup (cheap asda one) and I gave 200ml first thing in the morning and again at 6pm