DD3 [3wks] seems to like stopping breathing/breath holding..

[Nemoandthefishes]

awhen she was born we had an experience where she stopped breathing. MW slapped her couple of times on back and she was fine. The next morning it happened again but they needed to give her oxygen and suck out her throat from mucus. Well its happened a couple more times this week where she seems to hold her breath or something but seems to struggle to breath starts tugging a little but after a couple of hard slaps on the back she will breath normally althogh obviously be crying. This mornings episode has just shook my nerves as I dont know what to do about it. She seems fine in herself afterwards with no temp or anything eating well etc although she is a little snuffly and they think it was mucus that made her do it the first time. So has anyone had this happen??

[Nemoandthefishes]

anyone??

have just ordered an angelcare monitor so can rest a bit easier of a night

[belgo]

My dd1 had epsiodes of stopping breathing but she was a lot older.

I would take your baby to the doctor and get her checked out fully.

[cktwo]

Might just be mucus but it needs checking. Ring the GP's ASAP

[cktwo]

Or even NHS Direct today

[Claire2009]

My friends dd2 has done this a couple of times, and straight away gone to A&E for tests.

1st time, she had croup.
2nd time, she had bronchiolitis.

[Elibean]

dd2 didn't stop breathing, but she was snuffly and they thought she was mucousy. By the time she was 4 weeks old, you could hear a very slight squeak on the in-breath, especially when she was asleep (on her back).

It turned out she has laryngomalacia, a floppy larynx - not a problem in itself (unless its severe, but you would know that by now if it was!) as they nearly always grow out of it.

I would take your baby and get her checked out, but also wanted to mention the above so you would know what to ask GP about if she starts making more noise when breathing - lots of GPs don't know much about it, its uncommon (though not rare).

[bronze]

I would get her checked out too. Apneas are scary but We did the same as you with the sensor monitor and just keeping an eye on her

[Nemoandthefishes]

thanks all
she was checked but they said its just one of those things and if she is snotty/mucusy she needs to throw up to get it off her chest
I do have one dd who is brittle asthmatic who started with breathing probs at 3/4wks and was admitted to hospital not long after for the first stay in many!!

[miniandme]

Can a just add something a little different into the mix,watch out for silent reflux. My dt2 had Apneas while in hospital and at home,the midwife readmitted him and it was found he had silent reflux,when he was refluxing the acid from his stomach he was holding in his breath because it was sore (if you can imagine when we do it we draw in our breath ouch) he was doing the same causing the apneas.
Since being put on infant gaviscon in his feeds it has stopped and now at 17mths hes almost off the gaviscon completely.

[Nemoandthefishes]

mini that is a possibility as dd1+2 were both reflux babies and on enfamil etc

[Elibean]

V good point, mini - was going to add that dd2 had silent reflux along with her laryngomalacia (usual to have both together) and developed sleep apnoea later.