Advice sought - when to drop milk bottle & soother

Theboinkmaster

Hi

Could use some advice. I've a 18 month old boy who sleeps 12 hours a night.

He gets 260ml of warmed cows milk in an advent bottle first thing in the morning and last thing at night. During the day he drinks water in sippy cup with meals.

He gets 2 soothers in the cot at night and uses them on and off throughout the night. He used advent soothers 6-18 month size.

So questions are when to drop both of these? Obviously won't do both at the same time but when is appropriate age? Am concerned the milk is damaging his teeth as well as the soothers or causing choking hazard.

Obviously he's a dream toddler at the moment, doesn't get the soother during the day and sleeps 12 hours every single night - he also does a 2 hour nap every day 11-1pm and gets soother for that also. So we're all happy at the moment so I could just let it go on an be lazy but am concerned this is actually damaging him so need to take corrective action soon. Is the milk bottle causing more damage than soother? Is is the bottle itself causing him harm or the milk?

He only has about 8 teeth at the moment and brushes them each evening after his bath, but before the milk.

We could probably drop the morning bottle easy enough as he only drinks half of that sometimes and not too pushed anymore.

Drop morning bottle in April
Switch evening bottle to sippy cup in May
Drop sippy cup in June
Drop soothers in July

Something like that? But also if something isn't doing him any harm I'd like to just leave him as he is happy and we're all sleeping great.

Any advice?

farmchoice

Don't you dare!!

he's happy he's sleeping and he is drinking and eating, what more do you want?

i have a lad much the same age and he too puts away some amount of milk and he has a soother, he also sleeps pretty well and i would never consider doing anything that might upset that

his older brother and sister were never really milk drinkers and it was more of a worry then drinking too much! remember milk is natures perfect food and they are called milk teeth for a reason.

on the soother id leave it a while yet if it soothes him its doing its job.

you could just take it away and it might be alright but if it goes wrong on your own head be it, plenty of time for that later when you can reason a bit with him.

yours are the kind of problems that most parents would long for.

i would suggest doing nothing for at least a year.

shesty

I think I posted in another thread about this...soothers still going in our house.I'm not in a major rush.We'll drop it when she's old enough to understand that Santa will take it or something like that.As for the bottle,our 2 years and 9 months old girl still takes a bottle at night but I've just reduced it way down to an ounce or so.I think it will naturally work it's way out soon, when she's dry at night and we stop the night nappies (she's potty trained).Really it's up to yourself, but maybe do the teeth wash after the bottle, just for your peace of mind.

catrionanic

I wouldn't worry about the soother, but my sister is a dentist and feels very strongly that children should only have water in their bottle at night, as there are big links with milk at night and tooth decay. So if I was going to cut out anything, that would be the first change I'd make.

Dice75

Have 17mo twins on exactly the same routine bar brushing teeth after bedtime bottle. Shall follow with interest!

coffeyt

Have to agree with all comments so far my 2 and 1/2 year old still has soother at night. He dropped his milk himself just before his second birthday once I swapped the bottle out for a sippy cup, he lost interest after a few days as the cup didn't have same appeal. My 16 month old girl still has her milk in bottle morning and night but we brush teeth afterwards. I plan to swap out her bottle in the next month or so for a cup also and see how we go. She also has her soother at night time and her nap. To be honest I don't see an issue with the soother at night time up until the age of three. Will hopefully get rid of it then!! Fingers crossed anyway that's the plan!!!

Theboinkmaster

Thanks all for feedback, it's great to get other viewpoints. I know we're very lucky with our toddler sleeping so well I just don't want to cause issues with his teeth.

Seems to me the soother is ok to leave another 6 months at least anyway.

Seems it's the milk that's the issue so maybe in awhile switch it to sippy cup and brush teeth afterwards.

Theboinkmaster

catrionanic wrote: »

I wouldn't worry about the soother, but my sister is a dentist and feels very strongly that children should only have water in their bottle at night, as there are big links with milk at night and tooth decay. So if I was going to cut out anything, that would be the first change I'd make.

What about taking from sippy cup and brushing teeth afterwards, would that help? what actually causes the issue? he gets the bottle and then goes to sleep in cot afterwards so it's not like he has it in the cot and drinking throughout the night.

Kylie06

I tried unsuccessfully a few times to get rid of the dodi with my now 4 year old. It was only at Christmas just gone when he was nearly four that we finally managed to succeed. He only had it for bed time and it would fall out as soon as he was asleep so we didn't really mind.He absolutely loved it and it was only with the promise of Santa giving him an extra present that it worked. He missed it for a few weeks but he was old enough to reason with and explain. I would leave well enough alone for another while.
I would have thought that if your toddler had his bottle before bed and his teeth are brushed afterwards that this would be ok. Letting him fall asleep with bottle in bed is when the problem of tooth decay arises. As others have suggested, swapping the bottle for a cup might be the way to go. A lit of children love their milk before bed!

jlm29

I posted about something similar a couple of days ago, I don't know how I missed this thread at the time! My 16 mo only started taking a bottle a couple of months ago (breastfed until then), but now he loves it! He only gets one at bedtime, and no soother. I too worry about his teeth, but had gotten into the habit of lying down with him and a bottle on my bed, and leaving him drink it, then nod off, and transferring him to his own bed.
Tonight I gave him a bottle a good hour and a half before bedtime (which has gotten ridiculously late over the easter hols!) and brushed his teeth half an hour later.
His dad brought him up to bed and sat with him on his lap until he settled, and then transferred him to the cot. It took about 20 min or so, but it's a big change for him. I'm hoping to start getting him to go to sleep in the cot with no bottle gradually over the next month or so.

I know speech therapists and other health professionals would recommend bottles and soothers be phased out from 12 mo, but it's very hard! With soothers, once they're not going around with them all day, I wouldn't worry. My niece had hers way too much until she was nearly 4, and she was definitely very slow to talk!

My older boy got rid of his soother at 13mo- I left my brother and sister in law minding him, and they didn't realise he took a soother going to bed, so they put him to bed without, and he went off to sleep no bother. I threw them all out the following morning!

shesty

I agree....soothers live in the bedrooms in our house and they are only for sleeping.They don't come out and about.Also my older girl has zero problems with communication, it's getting her to stop talking that's the real challenge, and the younger looks to be heading the same way.It does mean I've been a lot less concerned about the soother use alright.

farmchoice

as someone who has experienced a child with a speech delay i can assure you the bloody soother is the least of your worries when you are dealing with that particular problem.

obviously if a child is going around at 2-3 years old with a soother in their mouth all day they are not going to be doing much talking and that's the issue, they talk less and as we know practice makes perfect, but its immaterial until they are starting to talk and like with most things its a question of ''everything in moderation''.

on the milk, give them all the bloody milk they want, in the blink of an eye they will be only eating beans and pasta or mashed potatoes and bananas or turkey sausages and whetabix or whatever ridiculous combination our fussy little eaters settle on. then you will be longing for the days when they would drink milk.
then all the bloody teeth you have minded and brushed and cared for will fall out anyway. in their place will grow a load of cooked distorted monster teeth that will require thousands in orthodontics to fix.
as soon as they are fixed a few will get knocked out in a skateboarding accident .
and you will wonder why you bothered to buy a new gum shield every week for the previous 8 years to replace the ones lost every single week at gaa, rugby, basketball, particularly as junior is only ever a sub anyway because he can no longer run the length of himself as he has taken up smoking with his idiot mates, this is also rotting the expensive teeth and to cap it all off he never went back to drinking milk again.