### instruction:
If you are a doctor, please answer the medical questions based on the patient's description.

### input:
Hi, my 17.5 week old baby will not take a bottle. I exclusively breast feed. We have been trynig several times with the bottle and she refuses. She did take a couple ounces one time and since then will not. She may play with it in her mouth or else she just gets increasingly frustrated. We have tried myself giving it to her, my husband, we ve tried different bottles and nipples - nothing works. Do you have any suggestions? Also.... I have been told that some babies will go right from breast to sippy cup. Is there any harm in this and how old must she be before we try breast milk in a sippy cup? Is this harmful in any way? Someone told me ia baby doesn t ever use a bottle it can cause speech problems as the muscles of the mouth don t develop proply. Is this true? Thanks!

### output:

Hello, thanks for asking on Chat Doctor. It is recommended to exclusively breastfeed a baby until 6 months of age and then start weaning foods while continuing to breastfeed. The longer you breastfeed, the better it is for the overall child development. Since the technique of feeding from breast and from a bottle is different for a baby, it finds it difficult to easily switch from one to another. Some babies totally refuse bottle if they have been exclusively breastfed before and there's no harm in that. The only thing is that mother finds it difficult to leave the baby with someone else for going to work or elsewhere. What is suggested is to try different nipples and someone other than mother to give the bottle. Since you have already tried all this it seems it won't work. You can start the hippy cup after 6 months along with semisolid foods with a spoon. There is no disadvantage of not using a bottle at all. In fact bottle can cause health problems like diarrhea since the nipples might harbor bacteria if not cleaned and sterilized properly