If you're breastfeeding and intend to occasionally use a bottle or eventually switch to a bottle full-time, timing is everything: after the third week and before the eighth week. If you start too early, you may permanently reduce your milk supply. If you start too late, your baby may not want to have anything to do with a bottle. After the third week, conduct bottle practice every day. You don't have to continue with daily bottles once your baby has demonstrated that she is willing and able to suck from a bottle's nipple, but do remind her at least several times a week that milk does, indeed, come in bottles. (Be prepared, though: At six or eight months, she may pull a fast one on you and begin refusing bottles no matter how successful she's been with them until that point.)

Another Chance

If you miss this introduction window, your baby may want nothing to do with a bottle and it may not be worth forcing the issue. You can just wait another month or two and then begin teaching your baby to drink from a cup. But if you must wean an unwilling baby to a bottle (because you have to be away from your baby or must take medication that would be dangerous for your baby, for example), it can be done.

First, make sure that you are holding the baby in a different position than the one in which you breastfeed — facing out, for example — or feed while walking around the room. Act thrilled and excited when you are getting ready to give your baby the bottle, as if you are just about to give her the most delightful treat. Don't act apologetic or worried. Expect your baby to reject your first attempts. Give up for a few moments and then try again, still acting as enthusiastic as you possibly can. Remember that even a few swallows taken from a bottle count as a win.

You can start by offering the bottle a few times a day when the baby is hungry, but take it away if she refuses. You might try offering a cup, or waiting a little while and then nursing her. The opposite method may work for some babies. That is, introduce the bottle when the baby is not frantically hungry, in the hopes that it will be perceived as something fun to play with, and then — what a bonus — the baby gets some milk, too. If this doesn't work, temporarily switch to a dropper or syringe; try anything that will get the milk into the baby's mouth from a source other than the breast.

If you're the nursing mother and are having no success with bottle-feeding, get yourself out of the picture. Let someone else struggle with this early introduction. Typically, most moms turn to the dads, but even better is an experienced bottle-feeder — her confidence will communicate to the baby.