milk for 2 year old?

[bettybobo]

We still give ds a bottle of milk at night (thinking it was good for him) just occurred to me that you're probably meant to stop at some point?
how much milk do you give a 2 year old?

Stop when you want. If he is happy leave him. DTDs still had bedtime milk at 4 - when it gradually became 'some nights'

I would think about moving from a bottle to a cup/trainer cup though to protect his teeth.

My children all have milk at bedtime (not tonight mind you - due to misbehaviour!)but just a cupful not a bottle sized amount now. They are aged 7, 5 and 3.

They had quite a bit up until about 2.5 and I think milk and dairy is still important in the diet but there is more scope for getting the nutrients from other dairy sources that's all.

Just stopped giving DD a bottle at bedtime - she is 2.3. Has milk with breakfast though and plenty of dairy.

My dd has a beaker of milk with breakfast and a beaker with her supper. She sometimes necks the whole lot and sometimes only a little - she is a good eater though so I don't worry about it much. She's 21 months. Her brother is 3.3 and stopped drinking any milk at 18 months, he won't touch the stuff as a drink since, but has yoghurt, cheese and milk on cereal. They are both fine. I agree with slightlymadslug - stop when you want but lose the bottle if/when you think you can.

my 2 & 5 year olds have beakers of milk in the morning & evening.

ok ill do that. Need to stop the bottle, i always had in the back of my mind that i needed too, because cups are better but he drinks 260ml so easily. He probably wont have that much with a cup.

dd 3.5 has a cup of milk morning and evening, usually - she doesn't always drink it though.

We did switch to semi-skimmed from about 2.5, she's not underweight (or over) and that much full-fat ongoingly didnt' seem like a good idea.

Never thought of when to stop the milk. Ds has almost 2 pints a day and he is 2.5, he has always been a big milk drinker though.

I always seem to be running out of milk! Dh also drinks a pint a day!

I think as long as they are eating well, then does it matter how much milk they drink?

my 2 year old still has warm milk at bedtime, and when she wakes up - she asks for it!

hana - my ds also asks for his milk when he wakes. He has his from the fridge though. I keep a row of cups full of milk in the fridge...!

mm not really worried how much, just thought the bottle part was going on a bit long iyswim

See what you mean about the bottle, maybe try a lidded cup for bedtime. ds had a bottle until he was 16 months for bed, I was so worried about changing it to a cup - when I finally changed it he didn't seem bothered!

I'm really struggling to get my 2year old off the bottle - can someone remind me why it is bad for their teeth? does it displace them?

mumfor1standfinaltime i lol at constantly running out of milk. the amount of times ive had to put the call to dh on the way home from work for moooorree milk
zookeeper i think its something to do with coating the teeth?

We used to have a milkman but it got so expensive and we still ended up buying more anyway!
Ds had to have semiskimmed this morning as we ran out of full fat!

You could try those nuby cups with soft teats - they kind of look a little like a bottle but more like a cup iyswim. My niece used to take a bottle to bed past age 2, my sister tried the nuby cup - it worked. They are around £2-£3.

It is bad for teh teeth because it take a comnapratively long time to drink fro a bottle compared a cup. With a bottle the flow is more or less continuous compared to teh cup. Milk is therefore in the mouth for longer and in contact with the teeth.

Milk is obviously not the worst thing to be drinking from a bottle but still not best encouraged by this age.

thnaks slightly mad slug