Of course, in a Utopian world, babies would only get breast until they are ready for a cup at the family dinner table. However, this isn't reality for many moms. I usually say "a month". It is put in terms of "IF you are going to introduce a bottle...". If mom will be working outside the home and taking baby with her or going to baby to nurse isn't an option, the baby will obviously need to get her milk "from another container". If she won't be working (or going to school) outside the home, then I point out that many such mothers never use bottles-they nurse exclusively until baby is ready to learn to take liquids from a cup. There seems to be a widespread attitude that all babies MUST learn to take a bottle, and I want to at least get her to think it isn't absolutely necessary. Again, the reality is that some will want baby to be able to take a bottle even if mom will be at home and we don't see a "valid" reason. If we come across as "never give a bottle", we may be ignored completely on all our suggestions/recommendations. So why a month? I know some sources say 3 weeks. Here's my reasoning: Most moms going "back to work" return at 6 weeks-some are fortunate to have longer. I recommend they give baby a couple weeks to accept that food can "come in other containers". So starting to acquaint baby with a bottle (or whatever method will be used) at a month (4 weeks) gives the 2 weeks before mom will be away. (We run across some who for whatever reason are returning much sooner-as often as next week. That offers special challenges-not only in regards to feeding, but I worry that mom isn't physically ready regardless of her feeding method!) Also, we tend to throw a lot of numbers at mom (at least 8 glasses of liquid for her, at least 6 wet and 3-4 dirty diapers per day for baby, nursing 8-14 times a day on average, etc.). Then "a month" is easier to keep in mind than a number like "3", "4", etc. I point out to moms that introducing a bottle earlier doesn't guarantee that baby will continue to accept it (in addition to the other concerns with introducing it earlier). She is bound to hear "if only you had started the bottle earlier, baby would accept it better now". Some docs are even saying to introduce it by 2 weeks to "guarantee" that baby will take it at a later date. I have seen a number of situations where baby may accept the bottle at one point, then reject it later. I tell her baby has gotten smarter, figured out there is a difference and is letting her know he definitely likes mom beter than the impersonal artificial container. Incidentally, it seems like problems moms call with come in clusters. For a while, a big percentage of calls may deal with sleep concerns, then those taper off and the frequent one may be "colic" etc. The "problem de jour" the last couple weeks for us has been the baby that refuses to learn to take a bottle. Go figure. Winnie *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html