18 Month Old Waking up at Night and Feeding Question

Hi!
I am an Infant/Child Sleep Consultant and Postpartum Doula. His eating at night is 100% a habit.
He can be completely off a bottle now as you will start damaging his teeth. Sleep is the most important thing for a human.
The best thing to do is hand over independence and let him get to sleep on his own with an appropriate bedtime.
After a year children only need 1/2 their body weight in ounces for hydration and should not be sucking but chewing and swallowing. Just like us.
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This is soothing.
He doesn't need that bottle. Especially not if he's been sleeping through the night without it up until now.

It might be a growth spurt, but if you start giving it to him now, it's just going to create more of a habit.
Put a sippy of water in his room with him, and if he wakes up thirsty, he can have that.

If this night waking, crying and need for a bottle is a new development, think about why. Our ped said that the baby doesn't "need" to eat at night once they reach 12 lbs, or 3 months of age. with some sleep training, courtesy of the Dr Ferber book, he's been sleeping from 8:30pm- 7am since 3.5 months old.

If your baby had been sleeping through before, be careful of giving a bottle. You might incentivize the crying and cement a new pattern.

He may need it right now. I nursed my DD and around 19 mos she suddenly started waking to nurse a few times a night. Then about a week later she started talking like crazy, and the new waking to nurse stopped. So he might be gearing up for a developmental milestone or growth spurt and just needs the extra nutrition right now.