When did you start giving your baby whole milk?

TeagansMom609 wrote: I was just wondering when everybody started giving their babies whole milk. Her Dr. told me I could give her yogurt now but that I should wait to give her milk around her 1st birthday. Im still nursing but she gets formula while im at work 9-5. I think I will stop nursing once she's old enough for regular milk.

Boys r us replied: My dr had me introduce whole milk the sametime I did the sippy cup. The way he had me do it was at 9 months to replace ONE of his daily bottles of formula with a sippy cup of whole milk. Once that was going good, a couple of weeks, introduce a 2nd sippy of milk into the daily routine. So I was killing two birds with one stone, getting rid of the bottle and the formula..just slowly so it wasn't a shock.

BTW..I had to heat his whole milk a little before he would have anything to do with it.

MomToMany replied: I waited until after the 1st birthday to introduce whole milk. BFing still benefits a toddler (kellymom.com).

coasterqueen replied: Cow's milk should NOT be given til at least one year of age. Not only for allergy reasons but because babies need the nutrients of breastmilk or formula for the 1st 12 months of life to achive optimal brain growth and development.

I personally waited til DD was around 18 months before giving it to her. She didn't care much for it before then anyways.

It's ultimately your choice but IMO I'd wait til at least 12 months of age. She isn't that far from it and why take the chance .

elvisfan replied: Well, I agree with the post directly above. I gave ds1 and ds2 whole milk at 1yr and ds3 really didn't care for milk until he was about 15-16months of age. And I still b/fed ds2 until 15months and ds3 still nurses 2times a day for only about 5min though.

ammommy replied: With my first, I nursed until 1 year so he got milk at age one. We started introducing it in a sippy at about 10-11 months. DD, however, wouldn't nurse after 6 months so she went on formula. Surprisingly, my ped OK'd the switch to whole milk at 9-10 months. She ate really well and her iron level was great. Generally, however, most peds recommend waiting until 11 months or a year.

ediep replied: when Jason turned one, we gradually mixed his formula with milk until he was getting all milk after a week or 2.

aspenblue1 replied: I started when Isabella turned 1.

My2Beauties replied: I started introducing whole milk to Hanna at 11 1/2 months of age! She was completely off of formula at the age of 1!!!!

A&A'smommy replied: Alyssa still doesn't drink it very well so I give her lots of yogurt, we started giving it to her right after her first birthday.

gr33n3y3z replied: Dr told me to do the same as Nichole did at the same age and a sippy cup and they needed the chill taken out also.

party-of-six replied: I intro'd it to my twins at right around 11 1/2 months to WHole milk. I breastfed them exclusively up until that point (for milk anyway) and continued to nurse them until 18 months for naps and bedtime.

I do need to add that the girls were swiping their older brother's sippys of milk for a couple of months before that...so, they were sneaking it as early as 9-10 months old with no ill effects.

goodgollymissmolly replied: Molly was 15 months before the pediatrician let us put her on whole milk, but there were unusual circumstances for us.

WillnCare replied: My doc gave us the ok for whole milk @ 9 1/2 months. Will got an ear infection and refused to nurse anymore. He went an entire week w/out anything other than pedialyte. The doc was comfortable w/him going to cows milk because he had been eating cheese, yogart,etc successfully. He didnt do well with it and I eventually got him on formula. Around his first b-day I re-introduced milk.


At 19 months he developed a "temporary lactose intolerance" The doc said it would clear up on its own after several weeks. 6 weeks later he is still having issues...we are going for an office visit tomorrow (im going to demand/ask the doc to find out why he is having lactose issues at least!)

coasterqueen replied:
Kylie has the same issue in a sense. We didn't intro whole milk to her til about 18 months at which point we noticed that she would get rashes and such and ONLY when drinking milk, not with eating cheeses, yogurts, etc. So she's on Lactaid for now because she's a tiny bit allergic to soy as well.

My2Beauties replied: Hanna gets rashes and stuff too but they go away as quickly as they come and she seems to sometimes have a hard time with her bowel movements, I wonder if this could be the case. I figured it was something his grandma was feeding her!

ctymom replied: We started whole milk at one year but we're still doing half formula and half milk. She's having a hard time with teething (on her last eye tooth) and the milk seems to make her BM's way too loose. So we make it 1/2 and 1/2. Plus we have coupons for it and have about 4 big cans of similac second stage so why not.

Pamela