What can I give instead of breast milk?

[cornflakequeenie]

I breastfeed my 8mo DS only at night now (even then he only has a tiny bit)

I'd like to stop this but I haven't got the first clue how to go about it. He hates formula, I've tried him on most brands for a week at a time but he's just not interested.

Does anyone have any ideas how to wean him off this, and also what I can give him (if anything) instead?

(Can I just point out that he doesn't have any milk in the day either. This isn't through me not trying, he generally isn't interested in having any - whether it's breast or formula before or after meals)

Thanks

It's not good for your DS to have neither formula nor breastmilk at this age. It is very important that he has a good amount because he cannot get all the nutrition he needs from food alone. So you are really stuck with either persuading him to take formula, or breastfeeding him until he is nearer one. Sorry if that is not helpful!

I know, I just don't know what else to try. He's started to bite me aswell and it's so painful. I've tried the shields but he just plays with it! He has formula in the mornings with his breakfast, but that's it.

He also eats a lot of dairy products like cheese, yoghurts, custard, etc. I have a HV appt next week for his development and I just know she's going to ask me how many milk feeds he has, and I'm going to feel like an utter failure because he has hardly any.

You are NOT a failure if you are offering feeds but he won't take them. It's not like you can force him. But maybe you could try some different ways to encourage him to have more milk during the daytime (which is when you would rather feed him anyway I would guess!). Would he take formula from a cup? Would he feed in a darkened room?

It is good that he has so much dairy produce. You could up the nutritional content by making cheese sauce/custard etc with expressed milk or formula instead of just cow's milk, I suppose.

If it was me I would lie be non committal about how many feeds he has. But then I don't have a lot of faith in HV.

Just a thought - could he be teething? You could try bonjela before trying to feed him. It helped with my DS2 biting.