1 year old doesn't want her morning milk

[lonerr]

My little girl is 13 months old and is on two bottles a day of cows milk. We offer her 8oz morning and night, she always finishes her night time bottle (dream feed at 10:30pm) but she's never interested in her morning bottle and will only drink approx 1oz before she pushes the bottle away.
We have tried giving it to her when she first wakes up (7am), just before her morning nap (9:30am), after her morning nap (10:30am) and she reacts the same way every time. On the odd occasion she will finish it all but not often.
I am not sure what else we can do apart from give the morning bottle up completely but I am worried she won't be getting enough calcium if we do that.
She loves her food, she has cheese nearly every day and drinks a lot of water.
Suggestions welcome!

Does she have yoghurt

Always one 🙄

Offer her a yoghurt instead. Or mix wheetabix in with it. Or fruit.

Between 12 and 24 months they only actually need 10 Floz a day and this can include milk in food so thinks like milk on cereal, in fish pie, lasagne, pancakes etc.

I'd just go straight to breakfast in the morning and give her a small cup of milk to have with it.

Maybe she just isn’t a huge fan of milk. Keep offering it to her, try a beaker as well and at some point she may be more accepting of it but honestly cheese, yogurt etc they all count. Mum worry never ends does it!

Mine had a breastfeed before bed and a cup of milk with breakfast at that age. So a cup of milk before bed maybe instead of the dream feed?

If she doesn't like milk I wouldn't push it but would try to make sure that she gets enough calcium. There's a good guide here from the BDA.

Don't forget to replace the fat and protein too. So things like oily fish twice a week really help.

I stopped drinking milk as soon as I would enough to refuse and lived to tell the tale. In fact cows milk is meant for calves so not an essential food.

Have you tried her with milk in a sippy cup? By this age ours got a cup of water and a cup of milk with every meal.

Eldest stopped breastfeeding and wouldn't drink any milk at all from 10 months until about her birthday (not for want of trying obviously!). Youngest was just on one breastfeed at bedtime plus milk with meals.

So many one year olds struggle to drop the bottle so if you can get through that battle with ease I'd be celebrating rather than worrying!

You’re also forgetting leafy greens. Calcium comes in other sources.

milk in cereal, yogurt, cheese and leafy greens with her meals. Job done

Drop both bottles, not needed just make sure lots of balanced meals.

Drop the milk - the breaded won't be doing her oral health any favourably

*favours

My DC never drank cow's milk and they're happy, healthy teenagers now. They're not cows, so I never saw it as an issue.

Unless she would be waking up hungry in the night, there’s no need for a dream fees once solids are well and truly established.

As others have said, she’ll be getting calcium from her food too, so don’t push milk on her if she’s not interested, as you run the risk of a negative association.

Is she eating yoghurt & cheese?

My boys dropped any milk to drink by 12 months. They were just not interested at all. DS9 won't even have cereal and hasn't done for years. The closest I can get to him having any milk is a hot chocolate! And that's only started this winter. Both of my boys however are cheese fiends and have plenty of yogurts etc. I think at 13 months it's ok to drop the milk.

While I don't agree with shaming people for drinking cows milk - you could consider trying your daughter with something like oat milk as it does contain calcium, she might prefer a different type of milk.

I've never liked milk as a drink, I probably got most of my calcium from bread (Milk Roll) as a kid. If she can get calcium in other things then that works too!

Exactly this.
What do you think is the reason human females have milk to breastfeed with?
Once the child weans off that milk, that's nature telling you they don't need it anymore.

They say offer milk with meals, but it never really worked with mine. She was only interested in water with her food.

I kept offering her milk during the day, and sometimes, she drank some. Sometimes, she didn't.
I never worried about how much she was drinking, especially as she loved (and still loves) all dairy products anyways. Make the porridge with milk, cheese in the food, and plain yoghurt - it will be more than enough dairy.

My daughter stopped drinking milk at 6 months, never had anything else containing dairy, she’s fine it’s not effected her at all

Why do you do a dream feed does she wake up for it? She's probably satiated from it and doesn't need more in the morning

One of mine rejected milk at about 12 mths. She had a banana and yoghurt for breakfast, sandwiches, fruit and cheese for lunch and whatever we were having as long as I could make it child friendly in the evening... water as a drink whenever and a little pure juice at meal time. As long as you're covering the protein, veg and carb requirements for your child's age you'll be fine. Also don't forget that 1 portion is what you can put into your child's palm, perhaps Google the eat well plate recommendation for your child's age. Most small children will happily eat yoghurt, cheese and butter and it sounds like yours is doing fine.