Perhaps your pediatrician is over reacting. Sure, by 12-15 months a sippy should be *introduced,* but by and large I have found parenting is not about sweating the small stuff. My daughter is now nearing 5. At 22 or 23 months she decidedly let the bottle go. She did the same with her pacifier. I loved my Pediatrician. He had a way about things like this "did you ever see someone arrive in kindergarten using a pacifier and a bottle?" Don't worry! He is not going to be scarred. Keep doing what you are doing, and offering sippy cups of milk, too. Let him work through it. Hand him his sippy of milk or whatever else and tell him "here's your big boy cup." All is OK, I assure you.

I wouldn't worry about it. I think the fact that he takes his juice and water out of a sippy cup is a major step in the right direction! I thinnk it is likely he just finds comfort in his bottle of milk, when the time is right he will let you know and give it up. I find that if we battle out the small stuff, it is just harder for all involved.

Best of luck it whatever you decided

{{{{  }}}}

Tena

Then I must be REALLY bad because my son is 22 months and I still give him a bottle! He drinks water, juice, and milk from sippy cups- or any cup really. But for nightime, I still give him a bottle of milk!

 my son was the same.. we use the nuby sippy for milk now and he loves it.. only took a week to transition from bottle to that with milk.. around the same age and he hasn't looked back. good luck. it doesn't make you a bad mom.. my pediatrician didn't even ask me about it.. i did it on my own.. so maybe the doctor is overreacting.. :)

My DD is 22 months, and while she takes everything else (juice, water, milk) from a sippy or just a cup, she is still on formula due to being very small.  And we still give her formula in a bottle, 3 x a day, since you can't shake up formula in a sippy cup.  The pediatrician has never complained about it, as right now it's more important for her to be getting the nutrition. Can you ask your pediatrician about the other sources of calcium while you work on putting his milk in a sippy or a cup?  Will he drink from a straw?  I hate to suggest it, but maybe if you flavor the milk?

 I hate to disagree with GnuMom, but I have to say I whole-heartedly disagree that the fight to rid a tot of the bottle is actually imperative enough to justify flavoring a young toddlers milk with all the garbage milk can be flavored with. The longer you can put off sweets, the better. They are far more of a concern than a bottle is, because the sweets will be around forever, whereas the bottle won't follow the tot off to kindergarten.

We dropped bottles (one at a time) cold turkey. That worked best for us rather than weaning off. My twins didn't, and sometimes still won't, drink milk from the sippy. What we did was bought the Nuby sippys with straws. They drink their milk from their straw cups now. They seemed to like that more than the regular sippy. Or, cut out the sippy all together and give him a regular cup to drink from. I have to do that sometimes to get them to drink their milk. They want to be "like mommy and daddy" and will drink it that way sometimes.  Up the calcium he's getting in food with yogurt, cheese, pudding, etc. He only needs 12-18 oz. of milk and milk products per day (that's what my ped told me for my 17 mo. old twins). 

It sounds like you've tried to drop the bottle, too. I'm a tough mom, so sorry if you take offense to this, but throw those bottles away if you want him off of them. Tell him bottles are for babies and he's a big boy. Or have him throw them in the trash himself.  If you give in and you pour his milk into his bottle, he's gonna work you every time. He may throw a fit for the first few days, but that's so much more worth it than weaning him off for months. At least in my opinion. :)

Don't flavor the milk. It sounds like he's already getting juice, which is filled with sugar. You'll have an obese kid before you know it if you're adding more sugar to his diet.

Good luck.

Ummm...I think Rachel drank her milk from a bottle every night until almost 2.  I didn't worry about it.  Like your son, she used a sippy and cups during the day.  But after she went off the bottle, she rarely drank milk.  That did worry me some, but she loved cheese and yogurt and ice cream (of course), so she was getting plenty of calcium.  Orange juice is even fortified with calcium these days.  Cow's milk is not that important for toddlers if they are getting their nutrients in other ways.  Rachel is almost 6 and LOVES milk now.

I have no problem with anyone disagreeing with flavoring milk, since I'm personally against it myself (and have had to argue with my DH about it).  I only mentioned it as a last resort, but I think it's better to get kids to like the taste of regular milk, so you don't get stuck always having to flavor it.  I also wanted to mention that I've had somem (limited) success since my last post in getting my DD to take her formula as a "bottle with a straw" using a straw sippy cup.  She likes to watch a Disney show while she has her evening bottle, and holding a bottle tipped up in front on her face can block her view, so I'm using that as my argument for a straw cup - she gets her "bottle" and she can watch Handy Manny, too.  I'm also telling her it's a "big girl" way to drink, and I give her water, juice and milk with a straw as often as I can.   BTW, she's also taking a liquid multi-vitamin for iron.  I wonder if your pediatrician can offer something along those lines, if calcium becomes an issue. 

Same here...my youngest son is almost 21 months and he drink his milk from a bottle.  We just don't tell the pediatrician...lol....JK.  He didn't from a sippy too.  Maybe I'm just lazy and stuck in a routine.  I'll try to take it from cold turkey and see what happens.  It's his bedtime one that I worried about.  Yikes!!

Suzie

www.zeebabee.com