Baby Bottles: When to Wean
By: Keith
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends weaning a child from the bottle at 15 months. That doesn’t seem too unreasonable considering most babies are ready to eat solid foods at 4 to 6 months and most doctors recommend transitioning from a bottle to a cup at 12 months. In fact, the AAP states that kids at 12 month don’t require nighttime feeding at all. But, need and want are two separate things. A lot of kids use their bottles (and the contents) for comfort. That’s why, when weaning a baby from a bottle, it’s the before bedtime one that is most difficult for them to relinquish. They want the comfort of the bottle before sleep. And, because so many parents don’t want to deal with a crying or cranky kid before bedtime, they continue allowing the bottle and formula (or milk) well after the kid should have given it up. Complacency however can lead to serious health problem as tooth decay and obesity are two side effects of the sugars in milk (or any kind of sugar given in excess).
Of Particular Concern to Low Income Families
Richard Kahn, a nutritionist at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, who works with low income families in the Bronx, says babies are capable of holding and using a cup by 6 months. He also says the 8 or 9 bottles of milk or formula per day that a lot of low income families allow their kids is a major cause of anemia. Too much casein (a protein in milk) blocks iron absorption and causes anemia which, in turn, affects brain development. Mr. Kahn continues to say that if there is no intervention by 24 months, cognitive functions take a permanent hit. You can see how this is a circular problem for society. Education and good nutrition are the pillars of upward mobility, but people who don’t get education hold bad jobs which causes them to not be able to buy good food or spend time educating themselves and their families about nutrition. And that causes this generational cycle of failure. Clearly Mr. Kahn has a useful societal function. Educating people who wouldn’t otherwise have access to this sort of information might someday be a factor in their ability to move up the social and economic ladder. Nutrition is the foundation of a healthy life, and it starts in infancy.
Breast Feeding:
One of my favorite organizations is La Leche League. They were a great help to Mely when she started breastfeeding Neil (and later Alan) as both kids had trouble latching on. Mely and I knew that breast feeding was going to be the healthiest way to feed the kids, and we didn’t want to accept failure, but neither of us had family nearby who could give us advice. We turned to La Leche League for help and they came through with a lactation consultant and all the advice and support we needed. However, our success is not other people’s success. While reading Mr. Kahn’s bottle feeding recommendation I begin to wonder how many low income families in the US are breastfeeding. The health benefits of breastfeeding are well documented. It seems intuitive then that the best way to avoid over feeding and tooth decay is by breastfeeding. While I agree with Mr. Kahn’s recommendations for bottle feeding families, I think time would be perhaps better spent, where a shortage of time and resources exist, encouraging breastfeeding education. As it is though, good advice is still good, and Mr. Kahn is saying relevant things.
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I think you need to take this one step further. Obviously there is a need for more breast feeding education. However, if you are speaking specifically to lower income families it begs the question of how many of these families have stay at home parents. If both parents have to work or work multiple part time jobs to provide for their families they may not have the ability to breast feed. It is also highly likely that they will not have the flexibility and/or the access to facilities like a mother’s room where they could pump and store the breast milk for future use. I would be surprised if many low paying jobs would be tolerant of mother’s taking regular breaks in order to pump (and even fewer that would provide the facilities/pumps/refrigeration) necessary to keep their supplies running.
Keep in mind I’m not disagreeing with you in the least. My son was breast fed for 11 months until he weaned himself and we dropped the bottle like third period french at a year. Our daughter is presently nursing and with my wife set to return to the working world tomorrow (yikes!) we’ve already got our support system in place for us to be able to continue to provide her breast milk. My wife has accumulated nearly a week worth in the freezer for me to feed her and we are very fortunate that the hospital she works at has very nice facilities available for her to pump and store. Granted some of the time she takes to pump comes out of her lunch time, but we know the benefits and she is willing to make the sacrifice for as long as her supply in strong.
PJ: Very good point. We take the ability to breast-feed for granted because it seems like such a basic right. But, if both parents are holding min-wage jobs and just barely getting by or, worse, if a woman is a single parent PLUS holding a min-wage job then — yeah, that’s a huge impediment to breast feeding. I consider breastfeeding a human right. There needs to be allowances for it and or pumping in the workplace. You’re right, a very sticky problem.
This stuff is still crazy to me. Lots to learn — and lots I will probably never understand.
We’ve weaned the kids from formula and bottle all together at 12 months. Cold turkey. They were good with it, even at night. My oldest daughter was fine if i remember right, my son had his thumb to pacify him, and my middle daughter had her pacifier. Those helped at night but were things we needed them to wean all in themselves.
As you know, my son broke his thumb sucking habit when he broke his wrist. And my daughter did great when we took her off the pacifier and gave her stuffed animal to replace the comfort at night.
While we have never went off any books as suggestions or a bible as to when our kids do certain milestones, we know that all kids are different and will reach them when they can either with or without our assistance. We use our experience from the prior kid to take as a guideline for the next kid and hope it sticks. But it’s hard not to judge when we see a parent of a 24 month old give their kid a bottle of formula.
Great read as always Keith..
I nursed my biological children til ages 2 and 3.5 respectively. However, my adoptive children were bottle fed and one of them was failure to thrive so the Dr. recommended he stay on the bottle until age 2. Starting at about 15 months, I only gave him water in his bedtime bottle though. We used the orthodontic nipples to avoid some dental issues.
Our son basically weaned himself at 12 months. He didn’t want the bottle anymore. He is always in a hurry to grow up. We were lucky to get by so easily.
For me and my babies mommy, it’s been kind of a roller coaster when it came to breast feeding and bottle feeding with our newborn baby boy Jacob.
While pregnant the mommy planned on not even bothering to breastfeed because she didn’t want to deal with the pain associated with it. But after he was born we were convinced on breastfeeding because apparently it’s more natural and healthy for the baby and it’s a lot cheaper.
However now our baby boy is about 12 days old and we believe he’s going through his grow spurt and he’s eating way too much and his Mommy to handle and she cant produce enough milk, and it’s been very straining on her, so we’ve decided to go back to bottled formula.
Exclusive breastfeeding (no help from formula or other supplements) is recommended at least for the first 6 months of baby’s life. But if it is a necessity for you to stop (for whatever reason – work issues, health, etc.), then you need to psych yourself that you’ll have to do weaning.