bottles at bedtime

[Christopher Hobbs]

My son is just getting his first teeth in. We normally give him a
bottle when he lays down for bed, but I'm worried that it might be bad
for his teeth. We tried switching to water and he immediately knew
something was up. Anyone have suggestions for night-time bottle
weaning or if it's OK to keep giving him bottles at night?

He seems to get hungry in the middle of the night as well, so we'll
usually end up giving him a bottle at about 2AM as well. It may be
time to start kicking the bottle all-together?

Thanks!
cmh

[Nahlyee Van Brunt]

I wouldn't worry about bottles too much.

Some toodlers prefer a bottle as it helps soothe the gums during teething. His baby teeth will soon fall out anyway.

Sent from my iPhone

[Michael Sims]

If the kid requires the bottle in order to sleep through the night,
then give him the bottle. If I understand the stage you're at
correctly, then your next step is to cut out the middle of the night
feeding and get him to sleep through the night entirely, but in order
to do that you'll want to fill him up at 10-11PM or whenever you put
him to bed - fill him up, top off the tank, squeeze a little more in
there, and then see if he'll sleep through the night without waking
up. Formula/milk, not water.

It'll be a while before you can cut out that evening bottle. Don't
worry about teeth. Teeth will be fine.

--
Michael Sims

[Mike Danko]

A bottle at night can lead to dental problems down the road yes. This isn't the big concern now though, it's more a matter of that it's much easier to start a more "grown up" routine now than later. The fuss and tantrums you'll face now are nothing compared to a few months from now, and setting the right routine now will help with any "I don't want to go to bed" problems later.

I've found the act of rocking was the harder thing to give up than the bottle, twice now. Should someone decide to reproduce with me again, I'm instating the PJ's, book, hugs, kisses thing quite early. The cries are hard at first, but they only last a short while.

Our pediatrician said that about teeth time there's little need for nutrition during the night. So finding another outlet for your baby isn't such a bad thing.

- Mike

[Matt Murphy]

Our experience has led to the approach suggested by Michael Sims.
Although I have wondered lately if it would be possible to give the
bottle 20 minutes or more before bedtime to allow the little one's
mouth to clear out all the milk -- evidently the risk to teeth comes
from un-swallowed milk lingering on the teeth overnight.

I think it would be possible, just more challenging, since we have an
established routine of bottle/nursing to sleep. I can't emphasize
enough how important it is to do that extra feeding before bedtime to
prevent night wakings.

[Colin Putney]

On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 10:41 AM, Matt Murphy <mmm...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Our experience has led to the approach suggested by Michael Sims.
> Although I have wondered lately if it would be possible to give the
> bottle 20 minutes or more before bedtime to allow the little one's
> mouth to clear out all the milk -- evidently the risk to teeth comes
> from un-swallowed milk lingering on the teeth overnight.

I'll put another vote in for Michael's advice. Getting a good night's
sleep is really important, and, especially when the teeth are just
coming in, milk won't hurt them, as long as you're not putting her to
bed with a bottle.

My daughter has almost all her teeth now (almost 30 months old) and
I've started brushing them. On the advice of our dentist we've
eliminated almost all sucking from her life - no more pacifier, sippy
cups instead of bottles etc. The only exception is that bedtime bottle
- it's so important for getting to sleep that we've left it in place
for now. After she finishes the bottle, I take her into the bathroom,
brush her teeth, floss, and then put her in her crib.

Colin

[Niels Olson]

doc here, with two kids. Bottle rot comes from the old idea of giving
them sugar water so mom could sleep. Breast milk if you can. How old
is the kid? When you feed them before the sleep, they pee, which wakes
them up. And they're still hungry. In general the routine should be
wake, eat, play, poop, sleep. Avoid extrapolating trends from what
happened in the last 24-48 hours.

In the end, everyone has tried everything. Rest assured you're doing
your best, they'll grow up soon enough and then you'll miss it. A
little.

[David Grant]

On Sun, Oct 16, 2011 at 5:39 PM, Michael Sims <mic...@michaelsims.ca> wrote:
> correctly, then your next step is to cut out the middle of the night
> feeding and get him to sleep through the night entirely, but in order
> to do that you'll want to fill him up at 10-11PM or whenever you put
> him to bed - fill him up, top off the tank, squeeze a little more in
> there, and then see if he'll sleep through the night without waking
> up.  Formula/milk, not water.

I don't think filling them up before bed makes any difference
whatsoever. If you give them more before bed, they will get less
calories at some other time. It's not necessarily true that the
calories (to make up for before-bed tank-up) will come from the night
feed, it may come from the day time. At night, after sleeping for
about 4 hours or whatever, of course you will be able to eat more, you
stomach is empty. As long as you keep giving them the night feed,
they'll take it, regardless of whether you tanked them up. Of course,
kids don't need a night feed and given that many kids sleep through
the night by around ~4 months (some earlier), a kid with a healthy
weight doesn't need a night feed at this stage. Most weaning
techniques I've read involve gradually reducing the amount or duration
of the night feed. If it is normally a 12 minute breast feed, for
example, reduce it to 10 minutes, then 8, then 6, etc... until it's
out completely. They then catch-up the calories during the day time as
calories are slowly shifted from night to day. If there are multiple
night feeds, do this with one initially, then the other.

As for the teeth, I recommend you talk to a dentist.

Dave

[David Grant]

On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 11:45 AM, Niels Olson <niels...@gmail.com> wrote:
> When you feed them before the sleep, they pee, which wakes
> them up.

Really? Unless you're talking about a different age then I'm thinking
of. I've never heard of a baby not peeing in their bed while sleeping
at night, yet tons of babies sleep through the night with no wake-ups.

Dave

[Jonathan Keel]

It's been several years, but with my son our pediatrician advised once they are old enough for baby cereal to put a little (just a little!) baby cereal into their bottle at night so their body doesn't digest the milk so quickly.  She also stated that this would help them ease into eating baby cereal as well.  

This worked out pretty well in that he slept a little longer at night and it eventually turned into eating baby cereal at night instead of a bottle.  Then we could brush his teeth afterwards.

[Matt Murphy]

Our little one always ends up with a wet diaper in the am, but unless
it's mega wet this doesn't cause a night waking. From my observations
(and experimentation) the most reliable way we've found to prevent
night wakings is to do a feeding about an hour before bedtime, then a
diaper change just before bed, along with some milk from breast or
bottle just before bed. Arguably we could avoid this last feeding if
we fed more solids during the day, but we generally offer as much food
as the little one wants during each feeding.

Note that with this approach (combined with phasing out milk at the
occasional night waking) night wakings are quite rare and she sleeps
from about 8:30pm to 7 or 7:30am every day.

When we do experience a night waking, it is usually on those nights
when we skipped the last feeding or when overall food intake for the
day was unusually low for some reason.

[Jem]

On Oct 17, 8:56 pm, Jonathan Keel <jonathank...@gmail.com> wrote:
> It's been several years, but with my son our pediatrician advised once they
> are old enough for baby cereal to put a little (just a little!) baby cereal
> into their bottle at night so their body doesn't digest the milk so quickly.
>  She also stated that this would help them ease into eating baby cereal as
> well.

But this is a known choking hazard. In fact, I've not seen this
recommended since the early 90s!

I'll never understand the American fascination with baby cereals. How
anyone can get excited about introducing nutritionless pulp the
consistency of wallpaper paste is beyond me.

[Chris Jennings]

Yes, not only is cereal a choking hazard, but so is this entire topic--
bottles at bedtime. I'm actually shocked that no one has mentioned
that yet. You should never, under any circumstance, leave a bottle
with a baby unattended.

[Jonathan Keel]

I should add that we never left our baby unattended wit the bottle.  We would hold our son while we fed him at night, would brush his teeth read him a story and it was off to bed. 

Not to take the topic off track of bottle feeding, but I don't think I'd say my wife and I were "fascinated" with this stuff as it was so tasteless.  We usually mixed it with pureed fruit or vegetables and mixed with cinnamon occasionally.  I actually thought the recipe tasted rather good.