Silent reflux - should I stop beast feeding?

[Roonerspism]

Grateful for any advice/experiences... DD is my third child and the elder two were breastfed with no problems (first child had a tongue tie which was resolved).

DD is 10 weeks and has awful silent reflux - no posseting. She is on gaviscon and ranitidine. She cannot lie flat. She sleeps next to me, either on her side or propped up. She screams most of her waking hours. She will sit in her bouncy chair sometimes. She will not lie in her baby gym etc and I really wonder how she will develop with such restricted movement.

Nothing is really working. (We have also tried osteopath, probiotics, colic remedies, tummy sleeping blablabla). The strain on the family is awful. DH isn't coping with the crying and I am starting to feel horribly anxious and utterly exhausted and helpless.

I love breastfeeding but am rapidly wondering if in this instance, I should stop. (I can't express milk for some odd reason).

I have already quit dairy and gluten and caffeine. She has awful days and not so bad days so I do wonder if it is something else I am eating.

I should add it is 10 weeks wait to see a gastro paed here so I really am on my own. And exhausted and desperate. I have ordered some Nutrimagen online but I'm so so sad it is coming to this.

Has anyone else stopped breastfeeding for this reason, with success?

Thanks

I'm so sorry for what you are going through. My LO had silent reflux too and it is so tough.

In your position I would try all nutramigen feeds for one/two weeks and carry on expressing if you feel up to expressing. If you can see a difference then stop breastfeeding. Tbh if I were you in position I would just stop breastfeeding all together.

My LO had silent reflux which medication helped for but also had multiple allergies incl wheat allergy. We only found at around 11 months. It was horrendous and I truly wish I hadn't breastfed at all and had put her on nutramigen from the start, it would have saved us all from so much pain and heartache and stress. My marriage was close to breaking down.

Sorry I missed the bit about you are not able to express. Try nutramigen.

Thanks hyper I'm sorry your marriage was under such strain. It is truly awful. I think "breaking up marriage" should be included in the NICE guidelines.

It is a bugger I can't express. I can hand express a little but no way could I manage it for 2 weeks as it takes an hour to hand express even a feed.

I will try the Nutrimagen. I am so sad about this. I wish there was more support :(

Did you have the Nutrimagen prescribed? If it works, I will have to ask the GP to do this as it use expensive when bought online.

Thanks - I appreciate your response.

Yes I got it prescribed. Ask them, they will give it. Just sound completely certain that it is allergies.

Don't be sad, it might be best for your LO in the long run. We weaned LO off breast milk at 13 months, and since then he had refused to have any milk, and we have to keep supplementing him with vitamins etc. LO also had low vitamin D and iron etc. I genuinely think that there are some babies who are better off on hypoallergenic formula than breast milk (even if the mother is all allergen free).

I had this with DS2, have you tried cutting out soya from your diet too as the proteins are very similar to dairy and could be causing problems.

We found ranitidine didn't help, but omeprazole gave us a new baby.

Sufferkate, did your LO have allergies too?

We used lansoparazole and it worked a treat for silent reflux

I don't eat soya. But I am now thinking about excluding eggs and nuts.

I eat a LOT of eggs so this isn't going to be easy. But I feel it is worth a shot...

The problem is that I have no certainty about any of it. My gut feel (!) is that it is, but I feel totally on my own without any advice. GP and HV seem to know so little...

Are you sure she doesn't have tongue tie?

The risk of stopping bf is that she reacts to formula and you can't really go back without difficulty.

Some of it might be over tiredness as well. They need a lot of sleep at this age!

You could try giving the National Breastfeeding helpline a call 0300 100 0212, open til 9.30pm. They are v highly trained and should be able to offer info & support (non judgmental too so don't panic about being 'told off' for considering other options! ) Good luck

Ask for a referral to your hospital, I got much more help there than from the gp. Omeprazole worked very well for my ds.

Be kind to yourself op, its a very stressful time. If you're on fb there is a great supportive group called Living with reflux - uk's national charity.

Thanks. Will give the helpline a shot.

I'm going to beg a referral from GP but it's a ten week wait. I think I might have stuck my head in the oven by then...

Will also checkout the FB group.

I really appreciate your suggestions.

Hi OP, sorry you're going through this. I'm sure you have completely cut dairy but are you being ridiculously fastidious about it? I found that when I even accidentally had a little bit of a brioche my baby would be back to screaming through a feed. Yes to also cutting soya - it's in almost all shop bought white breads and lots of biscuits etc. You may also need to up the drugs. We were lucky and managed to keep the breast feeding though I supplemented with Aptamil Pepti (on prescription from my GP) too. Don't feel remotely guilty if you have to stop. I fed my first DC for quite a while and am generally quite a fan of BF but I absolutely believe for some allergic babies hydrolysed formula is absolutely the best thing for them. It's not great for your body going onto such a restricted diet and feeding too, esp so soon after giving birth and with older DC.

Thanks green. Yes - I am really careful with the dairy as I have done it in the past for my own health.

You are right about cutting out other foods. Dairy/gluten are doable but the thought of other stuff is exhausting! Haven't heard of Aptamil Pepti - will check that out.

Did you try anything else? Or did it all resolve

Ds2 is allergic to dairy, screamed most of his first year, even on the prescribed milk. He is completely allergic to soya too and it's in everything. Double check all your packaging and read up about dairy and soya food products as they sneak it in under different names. My heart goes out to you: it is truly exhausting. Ds is 13 months and on v restricted diet but if one bit of the protein gets into his system he is up all night. I am hoping he will grow out of it and I survive it!

Ranitidine, going dairy free and time worked for us. Hard to know what was most important - though the milk allergy remains so that was probably a big thing. In fact weaning was also a huge improvement - I know it doesn't work for everyone but it seemed to help keep the acid down and the milk feeds dropped suddenly to 2/3 a day (and countless overnight!). Sorry I know that must seem ages away for you - I really feel for you, it's horrible and I felt so sorry for my poor baby and totally robbed of the lovely newborn days. It's true tho - it will pass - even if you do absolutely nothing, it will pass.

I feel for you. I could have written the exact same message 10 years ago. I eventually gave up breast feeding at 3 months having tried eliminating almost every allergen from my diet. My daughter took Renitidene and Domperedone and had Nutramigen feed (all on prescription). This transformed my life into one Î could manage.

In terms of the impact on her development, weirdly it made her very strong, resilient and sociable (what with all the being upright and carried).

Bless her, she still suffers a bit at age 10. She loves pineapple but chooses not to eat it because she gets what she calls "the sea in her throat". She also cannot swim for a couple of hours after eating as this triggers her reflux. This is all foreign to me as I didn't even get heart burn during my pregnancies.

Good luck!

Thanks everyone. How odd all our kids are struggling with dairy.

I wonder if this is a new thing or whether it has always been so, but the babies were labelled as "difficult".

Could it be onions?! I'm trying to work out what else could be triggering our horrendous days...

It could be egg or wheat? Or anything acidic like apple juice, or tomatoes?

I definitely think there is some kind of link between allergies and silent reflux. Just not sure what.

Hyperthread - sorry I've got a newborn so my heads a bit all over. In answer to your question, yes my son had intolerances to dairy and soya. I'm wheat and gluten free anyway so not sure if they would've had any impact. He also has a tongue tie (he had no chance!). Just wondering but I've noticed a correlation between antibiotics given soon after birth, and intolerances/reflux. I don't know if anyone else has come across this? X

Suffer, please don't apologise. Sadly my LO had antibiotics too after birth, given via a tube. I think that is all linked in with it too.

You seem to have tried everything. Give hypoallergenic formula a try. I'm hoping something will work for you x

Soya was definitely the worst food for us. Unfortunately I was laughed at by my gp when I took to DS2 to see him at 8 weeks. Apparently only a paediatrician can diagnose silent reflux due to it being so rare it knocked my confidence in myself and it took until he was 8 months before I finally got a referral and help from the hospital.

I ended up being queen of label checking and bf until he was two, by which point he'd grown out of the reflux and food intolerances.

Breast feeding a refluxy intolerant baby can be done but it's not always fun (Betty Crocker chocolate fudge icing is df and sf and is the only thing that kept me sane at times!).

My DS wouldn't accept a bottle by the time that became an option and at that point I'd become so used to watching what I ate that I just carried on x

We had our best day ever yesterday and I had soy so think it is not that.

And tonight has been awful - I had garlic today. So my current avoid list is dairy, gluten, caffeine, onion, garlic...
I guess that rules out Betty Crocker.

My GP is great and has referred us to a paed but it's a 10 week waiting time...