7mo refusing milk after weaning- help please!

[Daisydotty]

LO is 7 months and has taken to solids really well, generally eats anything I give him which is great!

However he won’t drink much milk through the day anymore, so is having most of his milk overnight. During the day, he starts drinking like he’s hungry but then pushes the bottle away after a couple of oz.

He’s having 3 solid meals a day now but still fairly small portions.

How do I get him to drink more milk during the day as he won’t finish a bottle anymore?
He’s never been a great sleeper and I think if I can get him to drink more during the day he might be less hungry overnight and we all might sleep a bit better!

FTM so I am currently winging it and can’t work out what I’m doing wrong and how to fix it!

At 7 months I'd cut him right back to offering food once a day, twice at an absolute must and only offer food roughly an hour after milk.

There's no rush to get to 3 meals a day and if he's now only taking milk at night that's going to be exhausting for DLL of you

Thank you! I’d gone up to three little meals a day because he seems to enjoy solids so much, so will try dropping lunch for now then and give him a big bottle instead!

Ok if you're happy to try something like this:

7am bottle

8 am breakfast

11 am bottle

2 pm bottle

4 pm Tea

7 pm bottle

And if you think he's going to wake in the night got milk regularly another bottle between 10 and 11

Oh amazing thank you!! Yes I will give this a go- wish they came with a manual haha! Every time I think I’ve got it all sorted something new comes along to remind me I’m just making it all up as I go along 😂

Welcome to being a Mum! I've felt more or less like that for years

We're in a similar routine with DD who will be 10 months next week, we have lunch around 1pm / bottle 3:30pm / tea 5pm / supper bottle 7pm

Breakfast is usually porridge with fruit puree
Lunch is a pouch or a couple of cubes of food
Tea is usually 1/2 pouch and a yoghurt

My little one started refusing milk until late afternoon around that time, once I'd introduced two meals a day. I called the health visitor and she said that I should consider stopping milk overnight (she was still feeding 2-3 times overnight). I didn't because I didn't have the heart to, and she went back to having milk after a couple of weeks x

When did you add lunch in? I’ll drop it for now but don’t know when to reintroduce it because I know he’ll eat it (his face lights up when he sees the bowl haha) but don’t want to do it too soon again!

According to the NHS you should introduce the third meal between 8 and 9 months.

I got around not giving them lunch by eating my lunch whilst they had they'd nap

I’d thought about trying to stop the feeds overnight, but he doesn’t actually wake up fully, just thrashes about and whines in his sleep. But when I’ve tried to not feed him he does fully wake up and cry and then takes about 2 hours to go back to sleep which is infinitely worse than a quick bottle and straight back to sleep!

Great thank you!
He’ll probably be very miffed tomorrow when he gets boring milk for lunch haha!

The night feeds all annoyingly started when the 4 month regression hit, before that he’d been going 8-6 without eating but he started sleeping very badly and I could only get him back to sleep by BF in bed with him, but stopped BF at 5 months and he’s just carried on wanting feeds during the night. Weaning seems to have compounded the problem because I think he is actually hungry overnight now, so it’s much harder to drop the night feeds until I’ve sorted out the day feeding!
so thank you all for your help, hopefully I’m getting closer to a full nights sleep!

Well lots of helpful advice as to timings for you OP. At least you know he won't be fussy with his food.

@Daisydotty

We did lunch then breakfast then tea (I was too stressed to do breakfast first 🙈 although DD got porridge)

I think we added in breakfast around 7 months and then tea at 8(ish) months

Weaning = It's a total head mess 🤯 we've still to introduce peanuts and eggs as eggs with DD. I've got a peanut allergy and DH has asthma so we're going to follow this as recommended by the dietitian. Also have baby piriton to hand just in case!

Smear on skin for 3 days
Rest for 3 days
Swipe at side of lip for 3 days
Rest for 3 days
Small taste for 3 days and then gradually increase the amount

Welcome to parenthood. I still feel like this after 22 years lol. Sometimes it's a bit of a push/pull relationship with food vs milk. It's not a linear process for most so as pp have suggested - trial an error with timings and solids vs milk is absolutely the name of the game. Guidelines are just that - advisory. Milk at this stage is still really important. Good luck op. Before you know it this will be a fond memory!

I think you might just have to suck up the night feeds for a while yet, sorry.

On a plus point daylight is supposed to help nighttime sleep so it's the perfect time of year to get them outside to see if that helps

Haha I’m certainly not expecting miracles, but thankfully he’s pretty easy to feed and resettle at night.
Hopeful for some improvement though, I looked in the mirror properly today and I think I’ve aged about 10 years 🙈

I know. Sleep deprivation is bloody awful isn't it?

if you’re worried about the amount then keep in mind you can also use the milk in foods.

mine had cereal made with formula for a good few months when they were weaning as they needed the calories and nutrient from it.

Depending on what meals you are giving made can take a few ml of milk added. When my youngest was ill at 8 months and refused milk it got added to everything - cottage pie, custard, cereal, anything cheesy…

@pregnancyrollercoaster
oh gosh I’ve not even really thought about adding in all the potential allergens yet, he’s mostly had veg/fruit so far- this is really helpful thank you!

I’d not thought about adding some formula to his meals actually, thank you!

wishing my area had better weaning sessions as ours was basically that homemade is best and some advice about choking but not much else!