Very Premature Daughter Having Touble Separating from the Bottle but Also Having

Hi D., have you tried Early Intervention while she is still young enough to qualify by age? I'm not sure if you are also in Bradenton or Sarasota, Florida but your pediatrician can give you their phone number so they can evaluate her to see what can be done because it may be is a "special need". My son was a premee too and he had feeding issues that till this day we are working on and he's now 6. He had sucking and swallowing problems. So I would advise, to ask them how to make any changes in feeding. Good luck.

G.

I haven't read the other responses, so maybe someone mentioned this already. Some children go directly from the bottle to a cup with no "sippy cup" in between.

I had triplets 3 years ago and they were born very premature (28 weeks). One of my daughters was having the same difficulty, but while she was still in the NICU. They referred her to a specialist who actually gave her therapy in order to teach her how to suck from the bottle. I am not sure if this is also available for your daughter, since she is older, but it is definitely worth asking about. Also, maybe if you give her the sippy cup and have her "practice" drinking from it, she might learn. If not, there are now sippy cups that come with straws attached - this might be easier. Good luck.

Hi D.! I had the same problem with my daughter. She couldn't figure it out! I tried several different kinds. The one that FINALLY worked for us was the Nuby kind. They had a soft spout on them so that she could bite or suck on them and the liquid would come out. Now that she has the hang of it, we use the hard spouts. I hope this helped!

My son was 5 weeks early and is now 10 months. I have been having trouble starting to switch him. After a few different brands he has found one he likes. The day care he goes to takes out the part that keeps it from leaking and he will drink from it. We started out with the toddler tops that fit on the Advent bottles and now use a Gerber style.
Also find her favorite juice and make it a special time that she gets it.

Hello,

You never stated how old your daughter is. The reason I am asking is because I have read some old nutritional books that state kids need to be on a high amount of liquids (but not juice) meaning milk, protein drinks, formula, etc. until they are at least three years of age because of the amount of growing they do. Apparently they cannot get the amount of protein they need just from food. So, with mine she kept the bottle until about three and then we continued with sippy cups and I made home made formulas up until she was five.

Might sound crazy but it really paid off health wise.

D.

We had to go through I would say about 5 different sippy cups before we found one my daughter could drink out of. It was by Nuk and had a soft spout. I would try that kind or various other kinds until you find one your daughter takes to.

Have you tried the Avent cups? The spout on them is softer and is sometimes easier to get the hang of before going on to the hard plastic spout. Had the problem of how to get the juice or milk out of the cup with my oldest son and the Avent cups worked great!

Good luck!

I had the same problem w/ my daughter. Solution that I found - Buy Nuby brand sippy cups. They don't have the valve (which makes it hard sucking from the sippy cup) but they are leak proof. They have them at Wal-Mart for for about $2 each.

My daughter had trouble sucking on the sippy cups too.

Here's a little trick! All of the sippy cups that you buy nowadays have this little plastic piece on the underside of the lid to prevent spills....Take it OUT! You're going to have a lot of spills at first, but just keep an eye on her while she's using them. Tupperware and WalMart make these GREAT sippy cups that do not have that little spill-proof plastic doo-hickey. At WalMart, they typically come in a 3 or 4 pack of bright or pastel colors and it's just a simple pop on clear or opaque lid. The brand is Luv n' Care.

You can also go to the Tupperware website and order a 4-pack of Bell Tumblers & Sipper Seals. Tupperware sells the cups and the lids separately, but no matter the price...it's a great deal. My daughter is 4 and she doesn't use the lids anymore, but she still uses the cups. If you go to the Tupperware sight, so you can at least see what the cups look like. The ones at WalMart (which are quite a bit cheaper) look exactly the same.

* go to www.tupperware.com
* search by category
* click on Kids, Kids, Kids
* then look for Bell Tumbler Set or Sipper Seal® Set

Hope this helps! Good Luck!
S. G.

Try the sippy cups by avent. They have spouts that are for 4 moth old babies and on up. You can play around with it unitl you find the one you want. The cups are a little on the expensive side. but you can buy one and then the replacement spouts to use. The spout are made of rubber (but stronger than the bottle) and easier to use. My second two would only use these when they fisrt started transitioning to the cup, those others are so hard to drink out of.

have you tried a sippy cup with a straw instead of a spout?my daughter does much better with those then with the sippy cups.she drips a lot with the spout ones.i think it's because she has a tiny mouth and they are not comfortable for her.but she does really well with the straws.they are bendable and they have a top that flips over it to prevent drips.and most pediatricians prefer them because the teeth have even less contact with the juice and milk.

My daughter was also a preemie and when it was time for a sippie- I ended up buying the one with the straw at the top- It really helped her a lot because she did not know how to use regular sippies either. Hope this helps!