Sunday, January 27, 2013

Success!


I am proud to announce that we are bottle free!
It is a freakin' MIRACLE.
I seriously thought it would never happen.
I stressed about it for MONTHS.
And I am now one proud mama.

I first tried taking the bottle away all at once and that did not go over so well.  Then I got to thinking about Avery's personality and maybe what would work for her instead of doing it "my way."  

Avery is appropriately obstinate for 18 months but also likes to be in control (I have NO Idea where she got that from ...).  She likes things to be her idea.  Getting her to eat food usually requires me to give her a few different choices on her plate and letting her pick what she wants at the moment.  She wants to feed herself, dress herself, shut all the doors herself...  

Anyway, the point being that I decided if we were going to be successful at ditching the bottles, we were going to have to convince Avery to choose for herself.  

I started by just offering her a cup more often.  Sometimes she would take it but she usually wanted a bottle anyway.  Then one morning when she woke up she asked for a bottle first thing (typical) and I took her to the kitchen to help me make her formula.  Before I was done measuring and mixing, she had seen a cup in the pantry and asked for a cup.  I decided it was a good time to try what worked for my friend Liz and hide all the bottles.  

Avery took the cup with formula but didn't drink much of it.  I poured formula into 3 other sippy cups and put them on a shelf in the fridge.  When she asked for a bottle I took her to the cupboard to show her there were no bottles in there.  Then I showed her there weren't any in the fridge either, but I let her stand with the fridge door open and see the cups she could choose from.  

For awhile she would take all of them but wouldn't drink anything.  FINALLY when she went down for a nap, she drank a whole sippy cup of formula and went to sleep and I cried mama tears of joy.  A miraculous feat, to be sure, given that for months she not only chanted "baba" nearly 24 hours a day, but would gag and cry whenever we gave her formula in a cup.


her current favorite cup: G2 Wave

So thanks to everyone who offered advice and suggestions!
I'm now going to go celebrate the fact that I do not have any bottles to wash tonight.


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