Needs Advice....2 Year Old Won't Go off the Bottle.

Time for the "bottle fairy" to come and take all the bottles away, and leave him a "big boy gift" in their place.

Seriously...just toss them. And then when he is screaming his guts out, you won't be able to give in to him. All that is happening now is he is learning if he screams hard enough and long enough, you will cave. Make it easier for you not to give in by just not having them in the house any more in the first place.

If you stop giving him the bottle, he'll stop drinking out of one.
It really is that simple.

He'll be mad, yes. But when he's thirsty enough, he'll drink from a cup just like his brother.

Umm...stop giving in?It is a tantrum... and if he learns that you will give in on this, he will start trying on everything sooner or later.

In our house the bottles just dissapeared one day... my daughter helpd me search everywhere for them. Once she realized they were gone she had no problem not using them.

Get rid of the bottles, it really is that simple.
When he asks for one just say, sorry honey, we don't have any more bottles, and offer him a cup.
Sure he will cry, but you'd better get used to it. This won't be the first time he gets upset because he doesn't get his way! He'll drink the milk from the cup when he realizes there's no other choice.

Throw the bottle in the garbage so you don't have it to give to him. He screams like that because IT WORKS! It won't get better, only worse.

By the way, a 2 year old has no choice about going off the bottle, but you do. You are the one who refuses for him to go off the bottle. If you threw all the bottles away, HE would have no choice, but you do. You can stick it out or you can buy him another and teach him that if he screams loud enough and long enough he can and will get his way.

This is YOUR choice mama. Don't put it off on your 2 year old!

Your child will cry over many more things in life than having his bottle and you will have to be firm and say 'no' to many of these things. Take the bottle away, you said you did now, and stick to it. I know how you feel as sad to say I did this with my second child when I was tired and had one a year older who kept me busy and I was lazy about it. I gave in. After that I didn't with our other kids and it does work, you have to be the one making the effort and sticking to it and it's work for you. Nobody likes to hear a child cry but 3 minutes is nothing and he will learn fast. Tell him no more bottles and give him the cup. He won't like it but can do it and so it's up to you. More battles to come.....sorry. :-)

Congrats to you for tossing the bottles. No one said the battle would be easy, but you will get through it and so will he.

I am the daycare lady for my crew (and my own child is heading off to college..and had..well HAS...an addictive personality for her comfort items!). So I feel your pain. For the daycare kidlets, its easier for me to be the bad guy, and quite often, cold turkey is the best way. A few days, maybe a week, of towing the tough line and it will all be behind you. You got this!

You already took the hardest steps! You asked for advice, then tossed them out!

Try to redirect or just ignore his pleas for the bottle. Tell him his option. Milk in this cup..or water in this one. Thats it. No negotiating, bargaining or emotional blackmail from a smart little tot! He will get over it, it just may not seem like it for a few days!

Be strong Mama..for both yourself and him. It will be ok soon!

God job. Throwing them away has made you the one in charge. If he cries send him to his room. He is allowed to cry, in his room.

You are the mom, and you are making the best decision for him. Being a parent is not for the faint of heart.

I am glad you threw away the bottles. Seriously, he has been controlling you and you need to show him that you are the parent. It may be ugly the first couple of days, but he will hydrate with juice and water until he realizes the cup is his only option.

Hang tough and do not dig the bottles out of the trash! This is just the first of many struggles to come, setting the tone now will help you in the future, trust me, my guy is STUBBORN, so I have to be more so ツ

The best advice I ever got was this.... take the top off! I promise it works! Its the comfort of it they crave and my 19 month old was obsessed with hers at that time and I was sick of washing them. All I did was offer ut to her with the lid off and yes, she was ticked! But after about 3 days she didn't want it anymore. We did the same thing with my nephew. Good luck mama and be strong!

Well, K., why wouldn't he scream at the top of his lungs? You give him what he wants in 3 minutes flat! Screaming works for him! He'll start using that neat trick to get anything else he wants once he figures it out. (It won't take long, I promise you!! I'm sure he's a smart little cookie!)

No more juice. Only offer water or milk. Tell him that he has to drink his milk first (put only an inch in the cup) before he can have his food. He'll be hungry enough to finish off the milk in order to get the food. If he screams, tell him that when he is ready to come to the table and not scream, then he can come back, and remove him from the table.

This will start holding him accountable for the screaming first, and persuade him to drink a little milk from the cup second. After you have been able to cut out the screaming from the table, throw away ALL of the bottles. If you have NO bottles, you can't give in to him. Tell him that you are very sorry, but the bottles are gone and he'll have to drink from a cup. NO MORE JUICE until he makes a complete switch to the cups for milk, with no more demanding a bottle.

Juice is empty calories. It takes up his mind and stomach and you need to remove it so that he can make the transition to milk.

Just do it. It's hard. It's what happens when they get used to walking around with a bottle. If you have another baby, wean from the bottle at 12 months once you go from breastmilk/formula to regular milk. It's much easier to wean from a bottle before they are walking.

Dawn

Aaahhh, the mommies who all find this such a "simple one" will be the same mommies who post that they can't get their toddlers to sleep in their own beds! LOL!
To each his own battles....anyway, I still have a 2 yo who takes his milk from a bottle, and I understand the days when you just need to not battle him, etc. What we did was keep his milk in the bottle (since the bottle is preferred, the milk is not) and we make him drink his "favorite" (the juice) from a sippy cup. We are slowly transitioning away from the bottles that way. You've got half the battle won already-he's taking "some" things from the sippy.
Really, as long as he's getting calcium and fat in his diet elsewhere, the milk is not really as necessary as most people think. So, offer the milk in a sippy, and if he won't drink it, then let him make that choice. He'll come around eventually.
I do agree that if YOU are ready to have bottles gone, then you just gotta pull the rug and gat rid of them. He WILL adjust, he just may not do it as quickly or nicely as you would like :)

3 minutes doesn't sound like a very long time. I understand the giving in part, but I'd be thinking that would happen after more like 10-15 minutes.

In lieu of the "giving in," start watering down the milk you give him in the bottle. Every day introduce more and more water (as a percentage) to the milk you give him in his bottle. I would also suggest offering him full-strength milk in a sippy cup at different times than when you offer him the bottle.

Alternatively, he doesn't have to have milk. He can get his dairy via yogurt and cheese. If he goes a couple of days or weeks without milk, that's ok. Maybe after an amount of time, if you offer him full strength milk in a sippy cup, he might take it.

Agreed with the poster that said, remove all bottles from the house. It makes it easier to stick to your guns when there is nothing else available. I remember actually showing one of my kiddos that the bottles were all gone when they went into a tear. After he realized I wasn't lying to him, he got over it real fast.
Good luck!!

Throw them out or give them away. Will he take water in a cup? Stop giving him any juice or soda!! NONE! He doesnt need juice and he shouldn't have soda. Give him milk in a cup or water (I'd give him two cups and let him choose) He will eventually take it. If needed give him watermelon, melons and grapes to make up for less liquids. It would really help if Dad or Grandmom or babysitter is the one to give him the cups of milk for a while, and you give water. You CAN DO THIS even if it makes him scream

I love the idea of having your son "help" you look for the bottles. That will make it real for him that they are gone! Maybe you could even use the supernanny technique of having him help pack them up to send to the "bottle fairy" (on the show she does this with pacifiers and sends them to the paci fairy) then the next day the bottle fairy can provide a small reward/prize for giving the bottles to the babies that need them.
Just a funny story that this reminds me of....Sometimes in the car my son will ask me if I brought him any fruit snacks. I usually dont have them on me... but if I just say no I dont have any, its like he does not totally believe me. Just check, he says to me! Just look and see mommy, maybe you have some. So, I look in my purse and then I look in the glove compartment, and tell him sorry but I dont have any. THEN he accepts it. And he moves on.

Only put water in it. If he wants milk, he can use a cup. My dd refused milk.for a while when we took.her bottles, she eventually started drinking it again.

For all the mom's who say its simple, I just want you to know, that i totally get that its not simple for some. Is it the night time bottle in particular or anytime? After two they can do without milk so you may want to curb the milk while getting him off. For us it was a two fold problem; she was drinking too much milk, and she wanted that night time bottle and it was hell if we tried to do differently. First I started tapering her night time milk down little by little until she was down to two ounces. She often asked for more, but we did not give in (don't let me fool you into thinking it was easy not to refill her bottle, she often cried for half hour or more). Then when it came time to take the actual bottle away, we had to deal with a miserable, angry, confused child who would not go to sleep. So yes, I understand why you give in. Its hell. So heres the magic. I tried to imaging the crying she would be doing in the dental chair from the cavities she was going to get by me putting her to bed with a bottle. I tied to internalize how sad it would be that i was stunting her growth because she wasn't taking in enough food but only milk (not the problem you are having, but you get the point). And with that, you take it away. It may be simple I suppose, its just not easy. It is in fact miserable. Just know that he doesn't really need milk anymore if that helps. When I accepted that I took the path of least resistance and had set up a situation that was going to be painful to change, I was better able to move forward because I knew it was my fault for going against conventional wisdom.

I think it's no big deal they are on the bottle at any time they need to be on the bottle. If the cold turkey doesn't work and you can't live with the consequences give him a bottle and let him get done when he's done. It's really no big deal.

If he does without milk for a while that's no big deal either. Good luck!