My twins are allmost a year old. I know they need to start weaning from formula to cows milk. Whats the best way to do this? Do I go cold turkey on the formula? Do I introduce it when they eat baby food?
It all depends on the child. My daughter had a horrible reaction when I switched her. She was pooping and throwing up everywhere. I had to do 50 50 and slowly take away the formula and add more milk after about 3 weeks she was on milk 100%. Good luck and hope this helps.
I started with 1/4 whole milk; 3/4 formula for about a week...then 1/2 whole milk; 1/2 formula...and so on..until we were completely on milk...took a few weeks....and i started 2 weeks before he turned one...he did great....the hardest thing was that it was cold...so I did warm it a little, but that too was not hard to transition away from...good luck and welcome to the club on not having to buy formula anymore....soon! :) Mother of a 15 mo. old boy
All three went cold turkey and had no problems. I think I used to warm the milk up a little bit at first to take the chill off.
I figured since they were already eating other dairy products like yogurt, they would do fine.
At 1 year, just make a switch cold turkey. There is no reason to not just do it unless they are super picky!
If they make a fuss, then do 75% fomula/25% milk and keep going!!
I slowly made the switch with my daughter. She would take an 8 oz bottle, so I started with 1 oz milk and the rest formula. Every few days I would up the ounces of milk. I quickly noticed that my daughter didn't care at all, so after about 1/2 and 1/2 I went all cow's milk and never looked back.
Mix it in a little at a time: 25%, 50%, 75% then 100% over a few weeks.
You can put the milk in a bottle and even warm it--if they still take bottles.
i gave minea cup of milk to try it. they never went back to formula. so i went cold turkey. i guess
I turned my son onto milk on his first birthday cold turkey and he seemed fine with it never wanted the formula back. i would give them a bottle of milk and see how they like it if there fine with it then good if not then do 50 50. thats what my sister did.
I did mine slowly too, like 25% milk at first, etc. and then gradually go up. With my daughter though I noticed that she didn't really care so I tried just giving her all milk one day and it was fine! My son was a little slower to warm up to milk though. I had to keep going slow and it took a solid month before he was off the formula. If you warm their formula still you might want to consider at least making the milk room temp but otherwise it should go smoothly.
Hi TwinMama,
With both of my sons (oldest one is 6 and the youngest one is 17 almost 18 months), I would do half formula and half cows milk and as the formula got lower, I would use more milk. This seemed to help the transition from formula to cows milk without any problems. Good luck!:o)
I. K.
You don't "need" to start weaning - the only reason really is that formula is expensive! We kept our son on formula past the age of two because milk made him really irritable/upset. He couldn't communicate at that age, but we assume it gave him a stomachache or something similar. For that reason I recommend going slowly and not all of a sudden have them drinking 20 oz+ of cow's milk a day. I also second the warming suggestion - they've probably never had 40 degree "milk" before!
