My 11mo is on soy formula. At some point, I have heard that it would be best to start weaning her off of soy formula little by little and onto lactose-free formula. Did anyone else have to do this? Was the transition hard on your baby? I know you can't just switch. It has to be done little by little.

By Vicki on Thursday, March 23, 2006 - 08:17 am:

Dd was also on a soy formula and we went straight to whole milk. I started just gradually adding the milk to her bottle an ounce at a time. Like for the first couple of days, 7 formula 1 milk, then the next couple of days 6 formula 2 milk etc. This was 10 years ago, so they might have changed ways to do things, but we never went from the soy formula to lactose-free formula. But I do know that we went to whole milk slowly to watch for reactions, but she did just fine with it.

By Ginny~moderator on Thursday, March 23, 2006 - 09:09 am:

Have you talked to your pediatrician. One factor would be why your baby is on soy formula. My youngest had to be on soy formula because he was allergic to all milk, including mine. My recollection is that around 9 months or so, I started transitioning to whole milk, and he had no allergy problems. (He did, however, turn out to have asthma, and I was told that children with early allergy issues will often develop asthma.)

I recently heard a bit on NPR that some doctors are saying it is better to not expose your children to potential allergy producing stuff in their early years - that avoiding allergy producing stuff will help prevent the children from developing allergies later, that they don't become "sensitized" to the substance. I don't know, but it seems to me that other than being very careful in how one introduces new foods, it is really hard to avoid potential allergens.

By Ginny~moderator on Thursday, March 23, 2006 - 09:10 am:

Again, talk to your pediatrician, but how about switching to soy milk?

By Kaye on Thursday, March 23, 2006 - 09:51 am:

Another train of thought....if your baby is doing okay on formula, and seems to like it, I might be inclinced to keep her on formula for another 6 months or so. The longer she can go without having to be on regular milk, the more likely she will be able to tolerate it later. They say that if you tax the digestive system too much it develops allergies. You don't have to have her drink as much formula though, so don't give her milk. Let her have other drinks, water, real juice, etc. Does she eat and cheese and yogurt now without issues? That would be another indicator that she could handle regular milk.

But as for your question. When I transistioned my kids I mixed bottles with 3/4 formula and 1/4 milk for 3 days, if all was well, then I upped it to half and half for 3-4 more days. If that was fine I just switched.

By Sandysmom on Thursday, March 23, 2006 - 06:56 pm:

Thank you for the advice ladies!