how much formula for 6 month old?

[LynAnne]

We've been weaning for just over two weeks, mainly BLW but also a little spoonfeeding. It's going okay so far although I have to say he only seemed to be actually ingesting a little until this week where I've noticed he's actually swallowing more. I know weaning is more about trying new flavours and textures at this stage so I'm not hugely worried about that.

I was wondering however how much formula I should be giving him. I've always fed on demand and he fell into a routine himself of about 6oz every three hours (dropping an oz here and there) so 32-36oz a day. He still eats this amount even though we've started introducing solids. I've read that six months old should only have about 20 oz a day. Am I giving him too much and stopping him from eating more solids by "filling him up" with formula? Should I cut down on the formula or wait for him to take the lead?

 

[DeuceMom]

deleted

 

[cupcake.]

My 6 month old DD still has over 20 ounces of formula a day. She usually takes 4 bottles about 6 1/2 ounces a day and her lunch is usually all solids (spoon fed puree). I try to offer solids (finger food) for breakfast and dinner as well but i don't really count those meals as actual "intake" if that makes sense. She loves playing around and tasting but i think she only ever actually swallowed a bit of broccoli and a bite of avocado.

That said sometimes she doesn't want to eat her pureed lunch or not all of it or it didn't fill her up enough and she's hungry before her next bottle is "due" (i feed on demand as well it's just that she has fallen into a roughly every 4 hour routine herself) so she ends up with 5 bottles a day which adds up to over 30 ounces.

She has sttn without needing a bottle once but other than that one of her 4 bottles is at night. I suspect it will stay that way for a while regarding her formula intake. Until she either sttn on her own or eats enough solids that her morning or evening bottle decreases. I do not plan on night weaning her until she eats actual meals of solids. So she'll probably definitely have over 20 ounces of formula for another couple months i think.

Maybe those recommendations are for when you start weaning at 4 months with all purees so that by 6 months around 3 bottles could be replaced by puree.

 

[MindUtopia]

I would continue to offer him formula on demand. Formula is a much more complete food at this age than most of the things he is likely eating, which will be limited still in nutritional value and also often not very calorific. It's much more important that he gets plenty of nutrients and a balanced diet overall than that he is eating loads of solids, so actually not bad if formula continues to fill him up and he eats less solids for now. It will change as he gets older, but it's still very early days. I fed milk before food until about 9-10 months, usually about 2 hours before a solid meal. Then maybe around 10 ish months, she stopped being very interested in the late morning bottle, so we dropped that and went straight to lunch instead and she had that bottle after lunch/early afternoon. I continued to feed on demand though, as much as she wanted and when she wanted it. It wasn't really until about maybe 14/15 months that I intentionally cut out a bottle (the first thing in the morning one) as she wouldn't eat breakfast at all if she had it from that age. I don't remember exactly what mine had at 6 months, but it was 6 bottles per 24 hours (sometimes 7 if she had a second during the night) of about 210-240ml each. That works out to be about 1350ml on average, which is 47oz. 20oz seems like not much for a 6 month old and I don't think we were down to that until closer to 11 months and that was with 3 hearty meals and 2 snacks a day.

 

[heychrissie]

We just kept offering her formula after her solids, and after a few months increased her solids a little and then she wouldn't finish as much formula, so we decreased the formula amounts. She still has ~20oz a day alongside 3 main meals and a snack. She hasn't got any teeth yet, though. We're anticipating her being able to eat more when she does, and so be able to give less formula.