Exclusive BFing and drinking from a cup issues

[ajenel79]

I have exclusively breast fed my son, so far, for 10 months
My only issue, which most of the time it's not an issue, is he will not drink out of a sippy cup. He's never had a bottle or pacifier and I'm quite proud of that fact. However, I will have to go out of town right after he turns 1 and would like for him to be drinking out of a cup so I don't worry so much about him not having anything to drink for 1-2 days. He's only nursing at night and occasionally during the day right now.
We've offered a sippy cup since he was 6 months old and he mainly just chews on the spout. I've tried different types of sippy cups and I've tried open cups with him, and that's not going so well.

Any thoughts? Usually he goes with me when I have to go out of town for work, but he's getting old enough now that it will be a little trickier to take him than when he was 3 or 6 months old.

[anotherpeanut]

My only suggestion would be to just keep trying sippy cups until you find one that works. We started my kiddo on a sippy around 7 months and he really like the Avent Magic Cups, they have a soft spout and he didn't have much trouble getting it out (he had very few pumped bottles and no paci) up until that point. Once he got the hang of one the others seemed to be easier. We also use the safe sippy all the time, I really prefer that one because its not plastic. Good luck! Or skip the sippy cup altogether and just go right to a very small regular cup (a tupperware lady told me many montessori schools use the salad dressing containers as cups). My kiddo definitely didn't have the motor coordination to be ready for open topped cups that early but apparently some kids get the hang of it quickly!

[twins+1]

Have you tried a straw cup? I had such good luck with straw cups way before sippy cups with my twins. They took to it really quick at 10.5/11 months old. I had to squeeze the cup a bit to get some liquid in their mouth and after a few days they had the idea and that has always been their preferred cup. I'm in the same boat as you with my 7 month old. He never liked bottles or pacifiers and so cups are kind of foreign to him. We're trying a tupperware (supposed to be bpa free) cups, but i will try the straw cup with him soon. We always used those first years take and toss straw cups (and just washed and reused).

[babygirlsmama]

I second the suggestion for a straw cup. I'm not there yet, but I have heard from friends that their EBF babies wouldn't take a sippy cup, but did well with a straw cup.

[crunchy_mommy]

What does he do with the open cup? We are bottle/paci free too, and we taught DS to drink from an open cup very young (maybe 2 months old?)... the trick is to let the liquid JUST touch his lips so he can control the flow himself. He can drink out of the open cup on his own as well, but has a tendency to fling it away & spill it still. The other thing we did a few times when he was younger was use a syringe or medicine dropper to feed him. Not sure how it would work with an older baby but it's another option if the cups or straws won't work & you want to avoid the bottle.