Help With Getting baby to take Bottle

[ToTeenyTots]

I know that there is a thread about this already but i cant find it.
Tashie is now nearly eight months and has always been breastfed. I was never interested in breastfeeding but my sister convinced me to give it a go and Tashie took to it straight away so I continued...But now I want to stop as I am not enjoying it anymore for a few reasons.
But Tashie has a different schedule to me and she isnt ready to stop in her opinion. I have tried every type of bottle known to man. They are all gathering dust next to my dummy collection as she wouldnt take one of those either. I have tried a few different types of formula. I have heard that you should get someone else to give the bottle but my partner is away alot and I dont live in a town so it basically has to be me.
So enough of my long winded explanations, I was hoping that someone out there would have some advice or tips for me.
I should add that the little devil will drink water out of a sippy cup, normal cup and bottle but if I put milk in she refuses. I have also tried using EBM but she is too smart for that and refuses that aswell
She is on solids but doesnt have a huge appetite.

[ditee26]

I am having the exact samep problem as you are. My son is 8 months old and has been breastfed since birth. On occasion I would use EBM and he would take it no problem from a bottle. Now that he is older he refuses to. My husband is also away and find it hard trying to feed. If you have had any luck I would appreciate you sharing it with me.

[Nickster]

Hi Tashiesmum,
I have exactly the same problem with my DD. I still want to breastfeed, but I work for a couple of hours one day a week and we cannot get her to take anything apart from water in a straw cup when I am not there, despite trying every formula, EBM, teat, etc, ever invented!
I remember reading this thread previously and a number of mums who had the same problem said that their bubs just had to be breastfed until about 1 year of age, after which they would gladly take a cup, but no bottle!
Sorry I can't be of any further help, but have you contacted ABA, they are really good for lots of tips, even if you don't want to BF anymore! They have a website with a forum similar to this, you may just find someone to help you there. :o

[First time Mom]

I had the same problem. I tried every type of bottle, teat, and milk including EBM but nothing worked for over a month. In the end my midwife suggested getting a 'cheap brown rubber teat' (often available at Asian shops.

I did not feed him for over 9 and 1/2 hours. My son kept crying hiself to sleep, only waking to cry himself to sleep again because I would not feed him. The midwife said they will not starve in a day as they have a lot of baby-fat. I cried so much that day. I will never forgive myself. But in the end he took a bottle unhappily. I had to keep this up for a couple of days but in the end it worked. Now I can feed using either bottle or breast and he does not mind. It is difficult but you have to persever (even if it is heart-wrenching)

Goodluck

[margot23]

hello there.

i also had the same experience, my son refuses to drink from the bottle and refuses formula milk. So what i did is to express breastmilk and gave it to him in a bottle for a week so he can get used to drinking from the bottle. As for the formula milk, i gave it to him using a medicine dropper every after breastfeeding/ bottle feeding of expressed milk for another week so he can get used to the taste. now he bottlefeeds formula milk.

goodluck!

[oscarsmilkbar]

hi there!

A suggestion is to try to have someone else giving a bottle to her when she's calm and not crying for food.

Also this may be an indicator that she may just be a non bottle person which you cannot change. My friend has a now 15 month old daughter that refused a bottle and there was nothing she could do in the end....it's not a failure...some bubs just don't like texture/"fake nipple" ....

good luck

[TLCC]

Hi Everyone,

My DD is turning 1 this week and we had a shocking time getting her to take a sipper cup and bottle. She really just didn't know how to get the bottle working for her. I had so much milk she really didn't have to work very hard when BF so she didn't like the slow flow of the bottle even when I used the fast flow teats. She also didn't like the sipper cups.

I finally got her onto the Pidgeon Straw cups and its been great. She drinks milk and water from the cups and I'm only doing one BF a day (the last one of the day) but I think I can drop that one now too. I started the straw cups when she was about 7 or 8 months old in sheer desperation.

I started out getting her to drink out of a popper straw just from a cup of water I would hold. To be honest it took about 8 weeks till she was confidently drinking out of the straw cup but that was mainly because she wasn't used to the volume of milk in her mouth, but we persisted at meal times and in between with snacks and now she will even go over to her cup when she is playing and can hold it herself and have something to drink...its fantastic!!

The cups can be a bit expensive but we have found they are terrific and have got 4 of them for the days use etc (can't wash up that much in one day!).

Best of luck to everyone. Its certainly hard work but pays off.

Good luck everyone, its definately worth it if you can persist and not put too much pressure on yourself or your darling little one.

Cheers, :)

[katyg]

I found the Pigeon Peristalic (forgive spelling) the best. The teat is designed to replicate a breast. It is made with two layers of latex and the teat stretches in all directions and in size, just like mum's nipple does. My son easy accepted it and I would strongly urge you to give them a go, you never know.