Breastfeeding: Reflux/Colic / baby reduced feeding

[lmerceronline]

Hi there...
I thought i'd post for a bit of advice as i'm quite concerned about my DS. He's 5 weeks and 2 days and has been having either reflux/colic symptoms for quite a few weeks but they are increasing and now he is not feeding properly at all. Am at wits end because tried nearly everything but at the heart of it am not sure if is silent reflux or colic, or perhaps both.
Am EBF, with recently a bottle of expressed milk at night and in the last few days a few more expressed bottles becuase of the feeding problems. Changed from medela calma to dr browns though am not sold on the difference yet.
DS is not a particularly screamy baby and seems a happy little boy when he is not in pain, straining, indigestion etc. He is an extremely windy baby and also is hard to burp -
in the last 5 days or so he has started to strain and thrash around as if with trapped wind on the breast or on the bottle and be unable to feed mid-feed - its torture watching him. It is always after a few minutes or so and i wonder if this is perhaps acid coming up from the stomach as he starts feeding or perhaps a gassy reflex from incoming milk??
it is really affecting his feeds as with the breast he does not get enough of the fatty hindmilk, worsening the problem, and with the bottle does not drink as much as he did, although he can still get down about 80ml a time.
He was fed a bit of formula in the first few weeks but i cut that out as he seemed to react very badly to that.

He chokes on breast and bottle despite the dr browns bottles, this is quite upsetting as can't do much about it! i think i have a fast let down and am trying a different feeding position but is from bottle too....

he also hates lying flat and seems only ok on shoulder and has started to only properly fall asleep on me and my partners chest

Think these problems have stemmed from antibiotic use (have had to take antibiotics for a whole month and still on them for broken down episiotomy wound).
His latch is slightly poor and working on improving it, but this is a problem with the bottle as well so can't put it all down to that really. Can't tell if worse from bottle or breast really seems the same.

he gets worse about 5am and it was a shorter window but now it carries on all day.

have also cut out dairy for last 3 days and his skin seems to be improving (had baby acne over face and chest so perhaps that is helping)

i have tried infacol which works for wind but seemed to make him worse? (not sure). colief - didnt see any effect, gripe water seems to help a little.

went to the dr and she gave me infant gaviscon but gave it to him for a day and half and the constipation was totally awful and didnt seem to see any immediate effects - how long would it take to work? he spent all night straining.

i am quite worried that if i carry on feeding him if it is reflux he could be burning his oseophagus and/or end up in a situation where he cant feed at all?

any advice much appreciated!!!!

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Imerceronline :( :(

One diffculty here is there is a 'scatter gun' approach to the whole thing - you are throwing so many things at the problem, it's not at all clear what might or might not help, what might be making things worse, and what are 'symptoms' and what are not.

In just five weeks, you have cut out dairy, offered infacol, gaviscon, different sorts of bottles/teats, formula, different positions, ebm, coleif, gripe water....it's a lot of attempts, and I wonder if just going back to basics without actually doing anything, and then after that, and only after that, trying to get a handle on what is happening so you can understand it better.

You could speak to a bf counsellor on any of the helplines or see one in person.

I hope things get better soon. It's horrible when you see your baby in pain.

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OP, how are things?