What a great forum topic!!!!!!

My 5 month old daughter must have a feeding aversion. She will start screaming as soon as you sit down with her to try to give her a bottle! We wouldn't be so worried about her intake if it weren't for her heart defect. If she doesn't gain more weight soon, her docs will be talking open heart surgery.

Anyways...how early is too early to introduce a sippy cup? She wouldn't be able to hold it on her own, but maybe she can learn to drink from it?

We've been trying to syringe her the formula she isn't drinking, but that's getting a bit harder. We've started solids, but only giving her a little bit once a day. We mix her veggies with extra formula powder, oatmeal, and mixed formula to "beef it up" a bit.

Any suggestions? Trying to do everything I can so we can avoid the NG tube. She had that for a week and a half while we were in the hospital recently.

I think you should give the sippy a go. What can it hurt? If it doesn't work, you can always go back to syringing. You may have to buy several types of cups to determine which one might work. I don't think it will hurt anything if you give it a try.

My GI recommends the sippy at ANY age if it helps with the aversion. Noah starts screaming when I open the refrigerator on bad days. He's the same way... Have you tried new bottles? Noah's not the best sucker, but he latches on to Dr. Browns better than the nursers that we were on during his first few months.

We had no luck with the sippy cups, since they all flow too fast for picky little Noah, but I'd give it a try. I've bought one of about every kind, and I think the ones with the silicone spout seems like it might be easier for a younger baby. Its more like a nipple.

Good luck, and I hope you can avoid the surgery! Let us know how she does with the sippy!

Our feeding spec had a trying everything from a huge variety of nipples to sippy cups and open cups when Daniel was just 5 five months old, and for him that was like two months. Unfortunately, nothing worked, but maybe you will find something she likes.

Never too early for a sippy cup. I started with my eldest around 5 months of age and it took a few months until he was really proficient with it and we got rid of the bottles at 10 months altogether. My middle son was introduced around 6 months of age and was off bottles completely around 8 months. My youngest is still on bottles at nearly 22 months, but he is now doing very well with the sippy cup (the last couple of months) and we are just having to pull the bottles which are now a comfort thing for him.


Our OT suggested using a regular cup and a little bit of fluid in it as well instead of a sippy as often GERDlings do have oral problems and do better with a cup alone.

Good luck and keep us posted.

Kaitlyn is 5 months too and we just recently started giving her a sippy cup... she doesnt know how to actually drink from it yet, but she loves that she can hold it and put it in her mouth... right now she chews on the spout thing.

We started trying w/Zac at 5 months. We found the gerber ones w/the rubber tip and he took to them well. It comes out a bit fast even w/the little stopper thing but he got the hang of it. He still hasn't figured out that he has to tip it but that'll come w/time.