To get rid of the bottle or not?? But... DD is 2.5 yo..

hi all,
I'm a little torn on this one so i thought i'd ask all the very informed mummy's for opinions and ideas.

DD is 2.5 this month and still has her milk in a bottle. I've tried numerous times to give it to her in sippy cups, straw cups, normal cups etc and she refuses it and cries till i put the milk into a bottle.

I'd love her to get rid of the bottle so i can take that cleaning task off my list but we've been trying again this weekend and this morning to give her the milk in a cup and she just cries and won't drink it and keeps asking me for "milka".

DD has a 260ml+ milk bottle when she wakes up whilst laying down watching TV, and will usually ask for a refill. She asks me for "milka" usually a couple of times during the day but i do not give her any during the day, only her water. She then has another 260ml+ milk bottle after her bath and before bed. Again she will often ask for a refill - so it's safe to say she LOVES milk. If she is getting sick I can always tell as she'll be asking for her "milka" all day long and will only drink milk, no water, so I know when she is getting sick.

So.. do I need to get rid of the bottle or should i just leave her alone? My mum thinks I should just leave her and that it's not doing her any harm.. I figure it probably isn't doing her any harm as such but I also hate that most other kids her age do not have a bottle and she does, but on the flip side I know how much comfort it gives her and how much she obviously loves it and don't want to be the nasty mummy to take it away from her and watch her cry for it.. So suggestions please..

After leaving my DD2 alone & not forcing her to give up the bottle, I'd encourage you to try.
At about 2ish I got DD off the bottle, but she still had a pop top to go to sleep with. It was when it started to change the shape of her teeth I stopped it completely.
Her two top teeth are rounded to the shape of a bottle/pop top. Thankfully she'll lose them soon!
It will be hard. For us any weaning was hardest for the first 3 or 4 days, then got easier. She is old enough now that you can talk to her about it. Explain that bottles are for little babies & that she is a big girl now.
Maybe take her shopping for a special big girl cup.

As long as there is other dairy in her diet, I wouldn't worry too much about her drinking milk. Yoghurt, cheese & other dairy products will be enough to replace it. its not needed at her age :)

Can you compromise with her and not give her so much milk? She probably doesn't really need that much milk at her age, but it has probably become more of a comfort item to her as opposed to a real need for the milk. Or you can try to get her to only have 1 at night and not during the morning. Use distraction if she asks for it? She seems to be content with water during the day so it might be easier to convince her to not have the morning one. I'm guessing too that if she is drinking that much milk in the morning she isn't having breakfast? Or at least having it later?

I checked her teeth and they do not seem affected at all by the bottle so that is at least a bonus.

Trillian - She has never really eaten breakfast but you are correct, most morning's she won't eat breakfast. I did think the milk was affecting her eating breakfast but i've tried only giving her a small bottle and then some breakfast and she still won't eat the food. I don't usually eat breakfast either and neither does my Mum so I have just assumed she is like me in the breakfast department. That sounds like a good idea, just start with getting rid of the breakfast bottle. We are going up the shops now so I'm going to let her pick a new cup and buy one of those crazy straws and hopefully that might get her to use that for her milk in the morning. Get rid of the morning one with the "you can have one before you go to bed" and then once the morning one is gone i can try to get rid of the night time one..

More suggestions are still welcome as i think i'm going to need as much "amo" as I can get.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day (for everyone) so you really need to try to get her to have something. Even if its just some fruit &/or toast. I don't allow my kids to leave the house without breaky.
Maybe not allow milk til after breakfast. Then it might be ok if she uses a regular cup with no lid?

Take this with a grain of salt because I don't have the references to give you on this but I have read that bottles can affect the development of teeth (adult as well) and jaws if given throughout the toddler years. Maybe you could ask a dentist about it. And if you decide to try and get rid of the bottle you could try why my mum did with me when I was about 3 - a MAJOR bribe. Basically I was told that getting a puppy meant I had to give my bottle up. I still remember ceremoniously handing over my bottle to the breeder! And apparently there was never another word on the topic. I know you're not supposed to bribe kids but maybe on the really big things it doesn't hurt to have a bit of a reward for giving up a much loved comfort.

Cohen used to be the same when he was sick he would only have milk. Not even any food. He is 3 next mth and only just stopped having a bottle about the beginning of December last yr. The only reason he stopped was we lost the only bottle that he had (I eventually found it under the coffee table) I told him that we didn't know where it was and I asked him if he knew where it was to which he said No. He said "awwww my bottle" but I didn't hear anything else about it after that. So we progressed to a sippy cup. when we moved interstate a few wks later we stayed at my DH's parent's house for a few nights and when we moved into our new house we accidentally left the sippy cup at Poppy's place. I explaned that we had left it there and that we couldn't go back for a little while to get it so I just gave him some milk in a cup. for the last wk he hasn't even touched his milk and I have stopped giving it to him all together. I think when the time is right for your little girl she will stop with the bottle and it won't be a big issue one day she will just drop it. Why go to all the hassle of having her crying and upset. it's just a bottle of milk after all.

clover - I am aware of the importance of breakfast but being someone myself who can rarely eat breakfast within 1-2 hours of waking up without it making me feel like vomiting I don't force her to eat. If she is hungry then I know she'll eat but the majority of the time her breakfast sits untouched. I can on the odd occasion get her to eat some fruit and the past couple of days I've had a little bit of success with her eating a small amount of cereal, but if I waited at home till she ate some breakfast then I could end up home all day.

tilda - thanks, i have heard varying bits of information like that before but I'm the same, unsure how accurate it is. I am going to check with my GP about it and I see my own dentist in 3 weeks so I'll also ask him. DD has all of her teeth and all appear ok from what I've seen. She has an underbite which she has unfortunately inherited from me but that appears to be the only thing teeth wise I can see as an issue. I don't think a bribe in this case will work, I've tried that to get her to eat vegatables and she isn't fussed unfortunately. P.s. and we already have 1 dog and we don't want a 2nd so no puppy here. :p

rustygirl - so glad that you have experienced the same, well not glad, but good to hear others have had toddlers who love their bottle. I wish the time was right now and she would just progress past it by herself which i've let her do for everything till now e.g. wraps, sleeping bags, she always just let me know when she was ok to move on from things.

This morning was a wash out and she cried until she had a bottle. We went shopping today and bought her a curly fancy straw which I told her is to drink her milka. I'm going to try to get rid of her morning bottle first and leave the night one alone so I have a bargaining chip up my sleave.. "You can have one when you go to bed later.." etc.. Tonight I tried to just give her one bottle of milk but after she finished the first one she asked for more. I told her she had already had her milk and it was time for bed. She played up in bed for another 50 minutes before i gave her another half a bottle and she is now asleep. I'm going to try a cup of milk and some cereal straight away in the morning, i'm pretty certain of the outcome but i'll give it a go. DD goes to day care tomorrow so i'll send her to school but pack a bottle of milk for her which she normally doesn't have at day care, but I'll send it just in case of emergency if they have issues settling her. I don't think she is going to be a happy girl tomorrow.

It's going to be a big few months for my little girl, trying to transition away from bottles, from her cot to a big girl bed, toilet training and then finally to get rid of her dummy. They grow up too fast and it makes me sad!

Similar issues here - but Sam only turned two a couple of months ago.

He has at least gone from being a total dummy addict to going cold turkey off his dummy by his own motivation a few weeks back - but the dummy has come back for sleep times as he had a few issues settling when it was so stinking hot recently!

The problem for us is that I really don't think Sam has the capacity to understand bargaining or bribes and bottles will be like the dummy - one day he'll just stop needing it. I have been tempted to just throw out the bottles and offer him milk in a sippy cup only... knowing that he will drink less milk that way... He only has two bottles per day - one before his nap and one before bed. They are such a part of his sleep-time routine that I really don't fancy the thought of trying to get him to give them up before he's ready.

BW

dont know if this helps but this is what i did my first DD wouldnt give it up she would have it at night only and when she was nearly 3 we introduced the bottle fairy who was going to come and take her bottle and my daughter loved money so the bottle fairy left her money and we took her to the shop to buy her a toy to cuddle at night when she went to sleep (she picked a plush spiderman). the bottle was our secret no one knew she still had a bottle and she was so proud to not have it anymore felt like a big girl.

With my DD2 i knew the struggle with DD1 so i told her when she turned 2 the bottle fairy was going to come and take her bottle and leave her money and started to warn her for 2 weeks before her birthday the bottle fairy was coming soon and it was quite easy. My DD2 was also the only one out of my 3 that had a dummy and that was taken along with the bottle i felt mean but she seemed fine with that

My DS was easier he had a blanky so when bottle fairy took bottle he had his blanky

butterfly warrior: that is exactly my worry, the night bottle is so much part of her routine and it's also alot of comfort for her. When we moved last year we lived with my parents for 3 months and that was when she really ramped up the amount of milk she was having to the point that she was waking up to 3 times a night and asking for it. Thankfully i settled that back down when we moved to our new house but the milk is such a part of her bedtime routine. She has dinner, has her bath, she gets out and has her bottle while she watches a DVD like Dora and then she goes to bed. I'm worried I'm going to mess up her sleeps when she is such an easy child to put to bed, she doesn't want a story read to her, i don't need to sing to her or pat her, just put her in bed and off she goes. DD only has her dummy if she is upset, e.g. she fell over or something, and when she goes to bed, she doesn't have it during the day and she sleeps without it at day care although we are having issues with sleeping at day care at present, i'm not too worried about the dummy yet. You are right, at 2.5yo I don't think she comprehends bribes or bargaining too much although sometimes she seems to understand a little. DD also has 2 bottles a day although her's are when she wakes up and when she goes to bed at night. She asks for it before her nap but i say she has it at night time and then she just goes to sleep.

I'm so torn on whether to proceed and try to get rid of the bottle or just let her be and speak with my GP and dentist and go from there. To top it off i'm about to start a new job that i'll be working away from home 2 days a week, I currently work from home so it'll be new for me to be away 9-5 a few days a week and I don't want to upset her routine too much.

ree - i love the idea of a bottle fairy.. I might steal that one if things don't work now and use that for the future. DD does not have any other comfort items other than her dummy but I actually think the bottle is more comfort to her as anytime she hurts herself or is upset she always asks me for her "milka" and if i say no then the dummy is requested next.