The Imperfect Community

honeybee · Queen of Imperfection Joined: 20 Dec 2002 Posts: 3163

I was plagued with supply issues after Paige's birth which led to her weaning early. Sad

She's been ff since about 9 months.
Now she turns a year old in a couple weeks. I don't have any plans to put her on cow's milk anytime soon, I'll continue to give her the formula.
But at a year how much should she be getting? She's a VERY good eater. Very. snorting

She eats table food very well. On most days she's getting 18-24 (3 to 4 six ounce bottles), usually at sleeping times. Does that look about right? Should I be cutting back on the formula as she eats more? She's already eating quite a lot though. I'm just not sure how to navigate this. Neutral

Petulant Pixie · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 4:10 pm Post subject:

Yeah, the thing with formula weaning is so weird, because it's not gradual. It's just BAM, they're a year old and now they don't need formula any more. I felt uneasy about it with all three of my kids and just kind of tapered it off. When Katie was that age, she was soooo small (she's still in the 0th percentile for weight, she was 46 lbs at her 9 year-old check) and there was an "after" formula that I kept her on. With Liz there was a toddler formula, too, and I used that for a while. The big change with the formula is the transition to sippy cups. They recommend that babies be off of bottles by 12 months. My kids, it was more like 15-18 months, but as we transitioned to sippy cups, we transitioned off of the formula. So, my kids were off of formula and on sippy cups by the time they were 18 months old. You just have to do it as you see best, really.

mammaX3_MOD · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 10:16 am Post subject:

When my daughter hit 12 months, I tried to get her from formula in a bottle, to milk in a sippy cup. She was a tough little bugger (it should have tipped me off that she'd continue to be strong-willed in everything!).
I ended up telling myself "I won't lose". I wanted to see what meant more to her; her bottle, or the formula. So I'd put formula in the sippy cups, and cold cow milk in her bottles. She was not happy, and even had a little dehydration (that I didn't reralize until an ER visit at 13 months. DH was MAD at me!)
But eventually, it all worked out. As for exactly how much she was drinking, I couldn't say. She had a full 8oz of milk or formula with every meal and maybe one more somewhere random during the day???
Also, Good Start makes a formula called "Follow-Up" for babies older than 12 months.

honeybee · Queen of Imperfection Joined: 20 Dec 2002 Posts: 3163

Hmmm. Is there some reason to avoid continuing regular infant formula beyond a year old? I know Dr. Sears (Rita and Jessica's favorite pediatrician) recommends keeping ff babes on formula to their 2nd bday. ??
Good Start and Paige did not get along, so I am not interested in trying their toddler formula. She's done very well on the Costco brand one and I don't think they make a toddler version. I know the toddler versions are usually a little less expensive, but I think the Costco price would still be better than switching to Enfamil or Similac toddler kinds.

I'm hesitant to try milk with her because Ethan had a very hard time going on milk. He drank enriched rice milk for a looooooong time. And Paige is already sort of extra spit-uppy when she has yogurt or cheese, so the milk thing makes me leery already, yk?

Petulant Pixie · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 9:09 pm Post subject:

I honestly don't know! I wish I had more advice to offer you on this, and it seems I should, having been through it three times, but I don't! I know that it felt weird to be giving all this formula and then suddenly STOP, so I didn't just stop, I transitioned over the course of a few months with each of them. But, with Alex and Katie it was to milk, and juice. Liz is not a milk drinker. She'll have a cup of chocolate milk about once or twice a week, the rest of the time it's orange juice or water. At first it was seriously diluted juice, like 1 part juice to 5 parts water. But, now she's almost three and it's pretty much just juice and pretty much in regular cups, not sippy cups. It's the calcium fortified OJ and she does eat a LOT of cheese, sour cream, cottage cheese and yogurt, so I don't worry about it.

I'd do the formula for as long as you feel comfortable. But, you might want to start adding water or very diluted juice in cups, too, just to mix it up a little. Ask the doctor about it, too. Ask at the 1 year-old visit. My ped never said anything concrete about when to stop formula, just that it was typical to stop at about a year old because they don't NEED it nutritionally anymore. They get their needs from solid foods at that point. So, it's really just a beverage transition, you know?

DietCokeHead · Queen of Imperfection Joined: 29 Apr 2002 Posts: 3805

I always started off by mixing the formula with whole milk and then gradually increasing the amount of milk and decreasing the formula until it was all milk.

At the same time I would also try and cut down on the number of bottles each day if they were doing well on solids. My Paige is a little oinker too so I will start working on cutting out at least one bottle feed soon.

julymom · Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 7:59 pm Post subject:

I kept Cooper on formula until he was almost 2. He had a milk and soy allergy though, so I was very hesitant to change anything. Also, he was 19lbs at a year, so we wanted him to get the extra calories. I eventually weaned him to rice milk, which if you're worried about milk, you might want to think about (plain, not vanilla). He's 5 now and still drinks rice milk.