Weaning problems - help needed!

[Purpleboa]

Hi everyone. So my DD is 7 months old. She's ebf and I introduced solids at 6 months. I was going for baby led weaning, did try with a spoon but she rejects it everytime. So far she's hardly eaten anything, just picks it up and has a nibble.

I'd planned to wean her off the boob after 6 months. But she's never taken a bottle and still rejects it now. I've been trying to give her formula but to no avail. She will take some water or formula from her sippy cup, but only a small amount.

She's also a terrible sleeper, always has been.

So I'm posting here because I feel like I'm failing massively. I go back to work in May and she needs to not be breastfeeding by then! I know it works for some but I don't want to do that. It sounds selfish but I just want some of my life back! I've loved feeding her but I'm very ready to stop now.

And I want her to be sleeping better. I feel if I can crack the feeding, that will lead to better nights which will be better for her (and for us).

So my questions are: how to get an ebf baby onto formula and bottle? And how to help her eat more?

Any advice hugely appreciated! TIA.

Mine was same. Gave up with baby led. Went with spoon. She has only started picking bits up herself but very rarely gets them in mouth. It took about three weeks of persistence with spoon.

DC2 is also a bottle refuser, and personally I'm not convinced that pure BLW works in those cases. They mostly play with the food and don't actually eat large amounts for the first few months, so this is not enough if they're not drinking milk.

So DC2 still gets her funger foods to play with, but also puree. She needed a good few weeks to discover that purees are actually food and can be swallowed. But once it clicked, she started eating happily.

Only time I can get her to drink from the bottle is when I stick it in while she's sleeping and do a dream feed - something you could try?

If that doesn't work, I can tell you that I stopped BF DC1 when he was 9 months old and after that he never took any milk from any cup or bottle, still doesn't. And he's still fine.

DD is six months and didn't like spoons the first couple of times (she's coming around now) but before when she's being stubborn I let her eat off my finger which seems to go down better
DD is bottle fed and from 4 weeks and all I can suggest on that front is perseverance, just see if you can get her to take a little bit at a time until she gets used to it. Its just different to BF so she needs to learn to drink from the bottle just like she's learning to eat solids.
Good luck