starting solid food-Questions

I just started solid foods a few days ago (cereal.) I know that the baby will get most of the nutrition from the formula, but
did anyone DECREASE the amount of formula when you started to add solids to their diet?

or did you find they drank the same amount?

Did any of you increase the amount of formula?

Prior to adding solids, I always knew to to increase the amount of formula whenever she would gulp her bottle after several feedings. As of now, my DD drinks 6-6 1/2 oz (5-6 bottles a day) I am hoping she will let me know when she wants more formula.

I know these are all questions for ped but I thought I ask you girls.

TIA!

Re: starting solid food-Questions

When my DD Reilly started solids, she drank the same amt of bottles and oz of formula per day. Slowly, as I added fruit and veggies to her cereal, she started to decrease her # of oz. It took a while though. It took until about 7 months to get her from 5 to 4 bottles per day. My ped said that as long as baby is drinking at least 20 oz per day, she is getting enough nutrition from the formula. HTH!

Re: starting solid food-Questions

Just a few tips that i thought were helpful when starting out giving baby food always give it to DC a 1/2 hour before they would normally eat bc if they are starving they are are not going to want to sit there and attempt to eat solids they are just going to want the bottle bc its alot faster. Also give 1- 2 tbsps of cereal and see how much she eats then give her the bottle and she will drink a little or a lot depending on how much cereal she ate then eventually once they start eating normal yuo wont have to give a bottle after the cereal bc the cereal will replace a bottle. Hope this helps it worked great for Ds and now or DD. Good luck

Re: starting solid food-Questions

thanks!

Re: starting solid food-Questions

No, I always kept the same amount of formula...they get very little of that cereal at first and the amounts are so small.

Also to go up in formula intake, I usually saw if he was sucking every last drop of the bottle and then still trying to get more.

Re: starting solid food-Questions

Hey Judy! I find that my kids got severely constipated whne i added cereal to both feedings. for lucnh they get a fruit or two mixed with 1 TB of cereal. For dinner they get just baby food-usually a veg or two or now that they are on stage 2 I give them the protein and veg combos.

Their formula has not changed too much-but you have to time it well. Feed formula first, give a meal about an hour later and then stretch the next feeding top at least 2 hours away

Re: starting solid food-Questions

I don't think the amount of formula my DD is getting has changed by much, if at all...

The reason I say this is because when I make her cereal, I make a full formula bottle and use how ever much formula out of the bottle it takes to make her cereal...then the remainder of the bottle gets refigerated for her next feeding which still usually comes around when she would normally be ready for her next bottle...So either way, she is getting the same amount of formula, some of its just mixed with cereal, if that makes sense

Re: starting solid food-Questions

My DS is 7 months and has decreased the amount of formula just slightly. When we started cereal I really didn't see a decrease in how much he drank at all, but now with 2 jars of baby food a day plus the cereal he leaves maybe 1-2 ounces a couple of times a day.

Re: starting solid food-Questions

Well Emerson all of a sudden jumped to 8oz/4X day and was still not satisfied so we knew it was time for solids. (She was 4 months old) As soon as we added cereal into her day she went back down (almost right away) to 7oz./4X day. Once she was consistently getting cereal and some fruits and veggies as well she went down to 6oz/4X day and at 9 months that is still the same amount of formula she is taking.

We always fed her solids about 1/2 hr. AFTER her bottle because the formula was important for her to finish, not the solids. If she didn't finish cereal or fruit I didn't really care but I wanted to make sure she always took all of her bottles. By 6 months she was on a schedule of bottle and then an hour to hour and a half later breakfast and then the same routine for lunch and dinner with her last bottle before bed at 7pm.

You'll be able to see as you start feeding your DC more and more solid food if they need to decrease their formula. Emerson would literally just stop drinking and pretty much always leave at least an ounce so we knew she needed less but she was taking in more solids so it was all good.