Help with Transition from Bottle to Cup for Milk Only

Updated on June 30, 2009
E.L. asks from Pflugerville, TX
16 answers

Hi all :) I have a 14 month old daughter who drinks water, juice you name it (other than milk) out of her sippy cup and has since she was about 4-5 months old... My hubby and I are desperatly trying to get her to drink milk from a cup so we can axe the bottles all together but any time I give her milk in a cup - either warm, cold, with choc or strawberry, plain .. basically in any form she spits it right out and refuses to drink her milk from anything but a bottle.. any tips out there from experienced Moms ? Shes our first and we are clueless as to what else we can try

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T.M.

answers from Austin on

My daughter was the same way. I used the Munchkin brand soft spout sippy cup for her milk only and she took to it instantly, she uses the hard spout for all other drinks. Good luck!

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N.R.

answers from Houston on

try the nuby transtion bottle/sippy cup my sister had the same trouble with her son so i bought that cup for her to use and with in a month he was off the bottle...also she had to get rid off all bottles in the house because she woud give in or he would find one but once the temptation was out of the way he had no choice but to get used to the nuby sippy cup....Good Luck!

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C.S.

answers from Victoria on

I started to anly put water in the bottle. So when she asks for a bottle she gets water. Then when she asks for milk, put in sippy cup. I used the soft tip ones from walmart - NUBY. Anyway, try a straw drink cup too. My daughter will only drink hers with a straw. Then eventually they break the bottle comfort and if they get extra water in the mean time so be it. Just remember old habits are hard to break. If you are consisitent regardless of her reaction, then eventually she will see that this is the way it is and she will adjust. Good Luck.

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D.W.

answers from College Station on

What I learned from my first daughter is that if she ain't ready - she ain't ready! :) We were so eager to see her next steps, phases, tricks, etc. that we forgot she needs to grow and learn at her own pace. So we had to learn that yes, we could try to give her a big girl cup, but like you are experiencing, she was not ready for it yet. I would restrict her to only big girl sippies and then try cups again at 18 mos., and then at 3 mos. increments. My 2.5 year old daughter is just now being a pro at the cup. Before then, I got small water bottles that had this neat built-in valve so it didn't spill everywhere. I know you can get them at Jamba Juice if you have one, otherwise, some grocery stores will have them.

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H.B.

answers from Corpus Christi on

I think I would just throw away all the bottles & tell her they all gone (if you do baby sign, then show her the empty cabinet & do the sign for 'all gone'). I think she will eventually drink it from the cup. Maybe try to give it to her in a straw cup, not a sippy. They make them spill proof in the same section of the store with the sippy cups. And on a side note, she is too young for all the sugar. The flavored milks & juices are just full of sugar. If you want to give her juice, buy a juicer & make it yourself, this way you know exactly what she is getting. Bottled juices are just empty calories.
Good luck & God bless
H. B

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J.T.

answers from Victoria on

I exed the bottle all together and gave him no choice. It worked for us. We still keept all our bottles for our second child...but our son has no clue about that.

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K.B.

answers from San Antonio on

E., I worked as an infant and one year old teacher for three years.

The experience may have jaded me a bit however in my opinion if the bottle is taken away completely as an option, this usually takes a few days of offering milk in a cup (and the baby being upset) before they get over it. However the longer we keep giving in the bigger the fit the baby has the next time we try the cup. For me even now with just one child I find it’s much easier to deal with the couple days of frustration than months of tantrums that reinforce the idea for baby that; I'll get what I want if I demand it.

If you take the bottle out of the picture completely she may not drink milk for a week if she is really determined, but they do forget and always give in. but if you give in you will be forced to keep giving in because she will learn how to get her way. Plus this is more stressful for everyone including the child, to keep having the same 'fight' with baby over and over again, when we know eventually it will end with them not having a bottle.

Good Luck,

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C.S.

answers from Houston on

E.,

Get rid of the bottles. Show her the cabinet where you used to keep them and tell her they are all gone. Don't give her juice until she drinks the plain milk from a cup. Only give milk and water out of sippy cups during this time of transistion. When she gets thirsty, she'll drink the milk from the cup. FYI...She is too young for flavored milk. The juice is also not good for her on a daily basis. The actual fruit is much better. Remember that you are the parent :)

Good luck!
C.

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P.H.

answers from Houston on

As another mother said earlier, maybe your daughter is not ready...

Please don't take it the wrong way and I apologize if I may hurt your feelings, but I don't understand why you want your daughter to drink her milk from the sippy cup. She is still young. Obviously, she knows how to drink from a sippy cup because she uses it for water and juice. Maybe for her, the bottle has an emotional feeling attached to it.

I know, my answer may be stupid.
My daugther is 2.5 YO and in the morning, she still drinks milk from her baby bottle. First because it's faster (we all need to get ready to go to work/daycare) and 2nd, she likes it. On the weekend, she eats cereal in a bowl, with milk and her spoon.

I tried to make her drink milk from the sippy cup (because daycare asked me to) but my daughter always hated it. When she got old enough to drink from a real cup (18 months), she drank her milk (for snack time) from the cup, but she had to keep her baby bottle for breakfast.

I would say be patient, and try again...

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E.I.

answers from San Antonio on

She's a little young to have the coordination to use a cup without a mess. However, walmart has these neat little cups that have a straw attached, it is an open up though, and she might find that easier.

Keep in mind, she might have an attachment to the sippy cup, not necessarily the milk, and most children her age get most of their calcium from their foods.

We had your concerned when we nixed the bottle and the girls didn't want milk anymore, Dr. said "relax mom, you said they eat yogurt, ice cream, and cheese, I see no issue."

Good Luck

J.B.

answers from Houston on

Mine did the exact same thing. I just let him continue with the bottle of milk a bit longer. When he was about 17 months I was able to fully wean him from the bottle. She just might not be ready. Best wishes!

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M.R.

answers from Houston on

My kids refused a bottle so I've never personally gone through this but a couple friends I had just put milk in a sippy cup and that was the only choice for a drink, they didn't give the child anything else to drink. Eventually they got thirsty enough and drank the milk from the cup. It did take some persistence though.

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Y.G.

answers from Houston on

Hi E.,

This might sound mean but my Pediatrician said to do it this way. We just dissapeared the bottles and continue to offer her the milk in a cup. She went 3 days without drinking milk at all. But the 4th day she accepted the cup like nothing. I kept calling my pediatrician since I was worried she was not getting enough liquids or milk during that time. But she said, my baby was trying to get her way but that her body was not going allow her to go without fluids for a long time. You just can't give in even if it hurts. Now, I am glad I havent had to wash a bottle since she was 13 months.

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L.B.

answers from Houston on

We had this problem with my oldest daughter. I had a really hard time with it--I felt like her heart was breaking every time I gave her the sippy instead of the bottle! She was in daycare (I worked full-time until my 2nd child was born), so I told one of her favorite teachers of our dilemma. When she was 15 months old, this teacher basically broke her of the bottle habit. Every time my daughter would ask for her 'ba-ba,' the teacher would hand her the sippy cup with her milk in it. My daughter would throw it on the floor and cry, hugging her blanky and saying 'ba-ba!' over and over. Her teacher remained very calm and just kept handing her the sippy. I think this lasted about a day and a half and then my daughter started drinking out of the sippy cup and that was that. No more bottles. I didn't have the stamina to do it, but her teacher did. If you have a relative or trusted friend that can handle it, you might want to try and arrange a day or two for them to take care of your daughter and try to get her over the bottle. Otherwise, you will just have to be strong and persistent! Hang in there--I'm pretty sure she won't take a bottle with her to kindergarten! Good luck.:-)

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K.P.

answers from Houston on

We are down to 2 bottles of milk and 1 bottle of water. Everything else is sippy. One bottle when he wakes up, one at daycare and one bottle of water for bed. I am slowly taking a bottle away and replacing it with a sippy. In the beginning it took time for him to drink from the sippy but this weekend I didn't give him his afternoon bottle and he took the milk in the sippy.

Keep introducing the sippy with milk.

I remind myself - every child is different. We are close to no bottle. Hopefully soon we will have no bottles.

You are doing good. We moms need to stick together but we also need to know each child is different and work with the child. Sorry if I went on and on. I'm tired of everything thinking my son should have been done with bottles a long time ago.

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S.O.

answers from San Antonio on

A straw. Otherwise, I wouldn't do this until after she turned 2.

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