Starting Cows Milk

I started my little one at 9 mos. She's not exclusive, she gets breast milk also. But I'm not giving her formula any longer. She's now 10 mos old.

J.

My son is 11 1/2 months old and I started him on cows milk right at 11 months. I ran out of formula and as I had been adding a little milk to his formula anyway (to ease the transition) it was not a problem.

I run an in home daycare and I watch a baby girl who is 9 months old. Her mother had her on cows milk and the doctor told her to immideatly switch back to formula until the child is 1yr old. Apparently the cows milk does not have the nutrients needed for a child that young. I'd double check with your baby's doctor before starting milk. Good Luck.

I would advise against it because the baby's system is not mature enough to digest the cow's milk. It can cause allergies that are difficult (and expensive) to treat, as well as diarrhea and a bloody bottom from the diarrhea that has to be treated. I know that formula is expensive and breastfeeding is time consuming, but I would advise to wait before giving milk. The baby's system is just not ready for it. Bless you and your family.

Be patient and wait til he turns 1 y.o. to be on the safe side. I asked my dr about starting early and he discouraged it. I hated formula so trust me it was hard. I am not sure if the reason was allergies or the g.i. tract digesting the proteins. Good luck!

Dear H.,
(That is my daughter's middle name, by the way)...
I started both of my children on cow's milk prior to a year old with no ill affects. They actually really liked it. My daughter, who is now 22 in October, only drinks soy milk for personal, dietary reasons, but you will be able to tell if your kid can't tolerate it in a digestive sense. I say give it a try and if your baby can't tolerate it, you will know. There is so much dairy in the normal every day diet that unless you want to raise your child as a vegan, (not that there is anything wrong with that) you should introduce some of it a little at a time to allow their systems to adjust. If they like it and their bodies cope with it, I think you should let them have it until they are old enough to make the decision themselves to cut it out of their diets. They need the calcium and vitamins and you don't want them to have a reaction, if they have never been introduced, to a piece of birthday cake containing milk for example.

Your child's body will let you know what they can and can't digest. I was a strict vegetarian, but I allowed my children to try everything. And what they loved, I let them eat and made sure they had it.

I think the point is to avoid allergies if possible, so that's the source of the recommendation. I'm sure that some children tolerate starting cows milk earlier and have no problem, while others develop allergies. It seems to make sense to hold off on cow's milk if you can until the recommended time, if he can get his calcium other ways. My breast feeding started to slow down around 8-9 months, so we switched to a combination of formula and breast feeding for the last 2-3 months of that first year and then gradually transitioned her to cow's milk, by gradually adding more and more milk into the formula to make a slow taste transition. Good luck!

My pediatrician said that if my children were doing well with other dairy, like cheese, yogurt, cottage cheese, pudding, etc., then it would be ok to try the cows milk at 11 months. But you could check with your pediatrician to be sure.

My son's doctor said that regular cow's milk is discouraged before 12 months because it has too much protein for the baby to be able to digest. Also it does not have enough iron like formula has (breastfeeding moms should be taking an iron supplement). Not enough iron can lead to anemia.

Just wait it out until closer to 12 months. If cost is an issue the store brands at Costco and Sam's Club are a good value.

H.,

I started all my kids around 10 months, but slowly introduced it. As long as she has already had yogurt and cheese and other dairy products and not allergic to either, I would think you could start mixing it with whatever you give now breastmilk or formula. I mixed breastmilk with whole milk and started with 2 oz of milk to 6oz of breastmilk and continued tapering the breastmilk and adding more whole milk until my guy was weaned at 1 years old. This worked for us because he didn't noticed much change because we did this slowly and by the time he was on whole milk completely he thought it was normal.
Good luck T

Hi H., I started both of my kids at 10 mos but one was allergic and had to swirched to goats milk. He outgrew it by 1 1/2 so I think that is why they like you to wait til 12 mos. Thank you to you and your family for the sacrifices you make while your husband is on active duty. Thanks to him abnd God Bless

They recommend waiting to introduce whole milk until 12 months. My daughter is 13 months, so I just went through this.

I think I tried it around 11 months but my kids never liked it much. Changing was a pain anyways because they didn't like the taste at first. Usually it was official on their first birthday I'd give them a sippy cup of milk and bday cake and from then on, no more formula.

I still did not start cows milk and my son is 12 1/2 months old. But I heard that if you want to start with milk before the year is better to use goat milk...

I found this comment in the internet:

http://www.drgreene.com/21_1486.html

Both my kids are allergic to iron so they didn't do well on formula, they threw up all the time. We switched my daughter at 1yr old to cows milk and she stopped vomiting all together. My mom switched my son to whole milk when he was four mos. old. which stopped the vomiting for him as well. (I was out of town) Our ped. had a fit and insisted that we add a vitamin supplement to his milk which...you guessed it...had iron in it and made him vomit. I stopped the supplement and added lots of baby foods with different vitamin content to bolster his intake and he was fine. He's a healthy happy 9 year old now, no growth problems, no food allergies. God Bless.

I have three boys and my first one I waited for a year, but my other two the doctor let me move to Vitamin D when they were both 10 months. My middle boy was 10lbs 4oz, so a big boy at birth and my third was only 8 lbs 12oz, but still let him have milk early. My third didn't do as well with whole milk, so the doctor said 2% was fine then. I loved the milk thing because formula was so expensive. My advice...ask your doctor...they would know best.

J.

I started all of my boys on cow milk between 10-11 months with no issues. "They" do recommend waiting until 12 months, but my boys were very big and healthy and already eating a large variety of food. We made a gradual switch from formula to cow milk (I usually stopped breastfeeding at about 8-9 months).

I think we started slowly introducing it around nine months. my son had been exclusively breastfed and he didn't start taking it as his normal milk or anything but if we were in the car or something, i'd let him try some cow's milk so i wouldn't have to pump a few ounces or whip out the breast in the car while it was in motion. By that time he'd already had other dairy including cheese and yogurt made with whole milk so I knew he was not having any problems with those foods.

Most peds will probably discourage it because they are like the main promoters for formula companies so I'd try to get a variety of viewpoints on this from a variety of sources. There may be reasons to keep your baby on formula if you have been formula feeding so watch out for that. It may have to do with iron or something. I just never worried about that kind of stuff since I was nursing... good luck!

Hello,
I confess that I started my boys both at nine months each. I gave an extra multi vitamin. But formula is very expensive. I was lucky that they both took to it ok, and they are healthy, happy, and growing like little weeds.

I started my son on cows milk at like 9 1/2 to 10 months old. So that way I knew he was off the formula by the time he was a year old.

I started introducing cow's milk at about 10-months old in the form of cottage cheese. I also tried to give my little one cow's milk in her sippy, but she hated it, so I did not push. She is 14-months old and I still cannot get her to drink cow's milk, but she is still nursing in the morning and at night, so her Dr. is not too concerned. I do wish she would drink milk though.

I kept my daughter on formula until 13 mos, just because cow's milk does not have enough nutrients to fit the needs of a baby's rapidly growing brain, body, and organs. It also does not contain enough iron to adequately fulfill baby's needs at this age. I would highly recommend waiting as long as you can to make the switch, but it won't hurt to actually introduce her to cow's milk at this age, just watch for signs of intolerance or allergy. I started with cheese, yogurt, etc, then slowly added milk to my daughter's diet. Be careful of possible constipation!
A.