Persuading Nearly 6 Mth Old to Take a Bottle

[TooTiredToThinkOfAUsername]

Have been working on introducing a bottle for a few weeks now. There have been a couple of times when DD has actually drunk from them! But v little each time and that has not been repeated recently.

Mostly she just fusses with the teat and spits it out.

If she is actually really hungry and either DH or I try a bottle for her she starts screaming.

Have tried a bottle at various times throughout the day and the night. No success.

What am I missing? How can I persuade her to take a bottle? Helpfully I cannot remember what I did with DS. Must be the sleep deprivation :/

I've also tried with the bottle being all sorts of temperatures and also splitting the teat to make it wider as that is something I can remember helping DS.

Hi,

I had the same problem, my DD refused the bottle since birth. At 10 months she is now completely bottle fed but it took some work. Start with the feed she is least interested in, for me it was the mid afternoon one, and stick with that one to start. I tried every bottle on the market and lots of different temperatures but I eventually settled on the MAM bottles. It took almost 3 weeks and each time she would fight, wriggle and scream every time I gave her the bottle but when she did, I refused her the breast. This meant she would have to go from lunch to tea with nothing but she was on solids so I wasn't too worried.

So, every day at 3pm I would offer the bottle. I tried different positions but the one that seemed to work was sitting her on my lap, facing away from me so that it was a different experience of being breastfed. I would lean her back on to me and after 2 1/2 weeks she just started taking it. After that I was able to replace the other feeds gradually (more to save me from the pain!) and each time I replaced a feed she was ok with it. Now she will feed in any position, including being cradled next to me.

It is hard work, I totally understand, but perseverance really is the key. Other advice I got, which I tried but failed, was to breastfeed her and then as she was tapering off, put a bottle in her mouth while she was lying next to the breast, I tried other people giving her it, tried it on a spoon, from a sippy cup, tried expressed milk but in the end it was just being tough.

Hope she starts taking it soon, good luck!

Thanks for your advice. I will try that tomorrow and see how it goes. Though as you say I need to persevere and not expect a miracle tomorrow! Fingers crossed...