To ask some mums for advice re: my newborn??

[TheHermitCrab]

Sorry! being a bit naughty and asking for some advice on here as it's popular! That's probably unreasonable in itself! But any help would be greatly appreciated.

Vomiting!

My baby is 3 weeks old and is vomiting about 2/3 times a day. It is not spitting up, she does that too, this is vomitting up a full feed anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes after a feed. All over her face, body, my body. We've changed our bed twice because of it, she's covered the sofa. My OH's mum told me not to worry, then she did it on her and her reaction was "ooooh no that's not right, that really is a lot!"

She is formula fed Cow and gate exclusively (she was combination fed up until last week) She takes anywhere between 1.5 and 3 ounces a feed. I burp/wind her every half ounce I keep her upright during her feed and 30 minutes following the feed.

We mentioned it to the health visitor on wednesday and I told her I was considering taking her to the doctors. She said that a doctor can't prescribe anything and that I should make sure I am not over feeding (I thought this was not possible!!) but she has a small appetite anyway and is only feeding 3/4 hours. She told me to buy infacol, which I did, and it has helped her wind, but she's throwing up just as much.

She's gained weight since birth, was 6lb 11 and on wednesday she weighed in at 7lb. She's sleeping well, eating fine, and if she vomits she roots for a feeding immediately after (And usually won't throw up immediately after)

She cries only for a feed and if she has a bit of wind. But nothing close to colic, she's just irritable between the hours of 12:00 and 6am.

The only thing out of the ordinary is she has a spotty/rashy face, but I've been told that's normal.

I'm going to ring the doctors tomorrow, But I'm sure they will fob me off because she is otherwise fine.

Does anyone have any ideas of anything else I could try to relieve this or should I just wait it out??

What bottles are you using.

Dd was after I switched to Dr Browns bottles. The tommee tipee she was taking in to hcg air.

I've had this! Have perfected my carpet cleaning now as a skill to prove it!

Don't worry, you have a refluxy baby. My DD had it, frequent feeder, worried about overfeeding but she would cry so we just fed her anyway. Not much made any difference, changed milk 2/3 times, got Ranitidine from the Dr when it became very uncomfy for her (colic was diagnosed, reflux was just a 'laundry issue' as she was fine on weight gain).

Now at 9m and if she eats a 'normal amount' I'll get lovely orange patches of sick everywhere, seemingly at random. But again, no discomfort (colic has been grown out of now, around 5-6m), just a lot of throwing up. Much less volume now, (was a lot when 2-12 weeks, like you, whole body/furniture affairs!) but she is 'spitting up' her food although weaned, in the same way a younger baby would posset a medium-larger amount of milk. Hopefully by 1 she'll have grown out of it too, but we own a huge amount of bibs and she's rarely out of one!

In the end, if she's gaining weight and it's not uncomfy for her, just place small buckets around the house to save your carpets and upholstery. Buy lots more vests, bibs and muslins in the mean time.

Thanks everyone :)

My HV wasn't very helpful it would seem from all your comments. I'll deffo ring the doctor and suggest allergies/reflux and see what he says.

skinoncustard/Jcandy - It's only 2/3 times a day. Not every feed. Its a lot, but not projectile. Mainly out of her mouth, sometimes nose. It pours out onto her lap, or our bed sheets infront of her, but only inches not feet

mummymeister There doesn't seem to be a pattern, it was always at night, now it's always in the day. She can have a 3ounce feed and nothing.. then have a 2 ounce feed and she'll vomit it all up.
Overfeeding - we are feeding on demand unless it gets to four hours, then we wake her to feed. She seems to feed on average every 3 hours. Then cluster feeds between 12:00 and 6.00am.

however Thanks for the congrats!. Wet nappies at every change before feed. Longest she's gone without a dirty nappy was 2 days but when it arrived it showed no signs of constipation. All seems fine in the nappy department!

Silvercatowner I have no intention as finding the forum advice as gospel, but sometimes the best people to ask are mothers themselves, especially when a health visitor fobs me off, I took her advice with the infacol, and although it's helped her crying/wind/irritability she is still puking a lot, so will obviously go to a doctor. But with other people's experiences I can make sure I'm not fobbed off.

BertieBotts Yes it's 2/3 times a day, BUT she doesn't seem to care, sometimes she's fast asleep, opens her eyes when she vomits, and she's straight back asleep while I'm cleaning her, then about 10 mins later she's rooting again, because she's just puked. It distresses me more than her!

DisappointedOne Dried up on breast milk. I was wearing breast pads at 6 months pregnant. The BF lady put me on expressing at the hospital because she wouldn't latch or settle for a number of reasons and they needed her feeding as she was on antibiotics. We were in hospital for a week and I was storing extra milk in the fridge I was doing that well. Gradually, even though expressing and skin to skin every 2 hours, and 3 hours at night, my milk has dried up! I can't even get 30mil on 35 mins of pumping, tried everything and had BF support, but I'm just dried up! not even needing to express for comfort... nothing there :(

tobysmum77 She is tongue tied but went over 2 weeks without a puke, it's a new thing for her.
As for more than 3 oz. She's only just turned 7lbs, so yes 3 weeks old can take more, but the average 3week old is much bigger than her. Sometimes she takes 1oz, sometimes 3. I don't push her for anymore than she wants.

Luckily we catch her while shes doing it, she's never done it lying down , but each time she doesn't seem to have the instinct to turn her head, she sits there with it gathering in her mouth/throat and you have to tip her forward/to the side to help her get it out!

DS2 did this- used to drive me mad covering us both, the sofa, the carpet, his car seat etc. He also was very content, gaining weight and generally thriving. He eventually grew out of it, gradual improvement until stopped altogether by about 9months. Still worth a trip to gp for peace of mind.

Doctor definitely.

Is she gaining weight? Nappies productive? True projectile vomiting then hungry again straight away could be reflux but also could be pyloric stenosis which needs checking out (unlikely if thriving though)

HV needs to remember there's much more to medicine than prescriptions, too.

PiperIsTerrysChoclateOrange I am actually using Tommee Tippee closer to nature, have since she was on bottles, but it's only the last week she's started being sick..

She has been on C&G since the hospital, they told me to keep giving her the same food they had been topping her up on.

I'd agree with those suggesting it could be reflux. DS was sick a lot, with no other symptoms, and always gained weight steadily. The HV wasn't interested because he was otherwise well, and gaining weight, so we just put up with it, until we started weaning him, and he got so bad he could not eat anything apart from yogurt. He was given Gaviscon, and it was like magic.

Knottyknitter nappies are fine. Her birth weight was 6lb 11, she lost a bit, but no where near the 10% allowable. Gained since and wednesday she was 7lb.

I took her to get weighed because of the puking, the clinic was empty and the HV asked me why I wanted her weighing. I explained and she basically told me I was being over the top and that the weighing becomes a paranoid thing for the mother and not helpful for the baby...etc. I thought vomiting was a very reasonable excuse to have a weigh in. She told me there's no need to weigh her again until my HV sees me on the 11th Feb unless she shows signs of being unwell.

"What are you expecting from a doctor?" were her words.... "A diagnosis" was my response... :/

honestly, some HV's are about as much use as a china mallet.

ignore, and go to the drs :)

Will ring the docs tomorrow and be a pushy parent! :)

the tongue tie caused my friends baby to be sick more as he grew, it wasn't from birth. If she is tongue tied I would look into getting it snipped.

the 3oz comment was just in response to the walnut sized tummy remark of another poster. Of course she needs to be fed the amount she wants . Ime also (of only 2dds) the amount they drink isn't related to their size at all one of mine took hardly anything the other was a complete milk monster but they both followed the 25th centile line

Always Follow your instinct and go to the doctor OP. My little one had a rotten virus early on that meant she brought everything up about 20mins later. They couldn't give her anything, I just had to feed her little and often to avoid filling her up so to speak. It took about a week to calm back down and then her Dad & I got wiped out by the same thing for a week each.

Personally I have felt seriously let down by HVs, either giving conflicting advice (i.e. the same person contradicting themselves more than once within the space of 5 minutes) or just spouting rubbish. I'd always rather have the assurance of a proper medical opinion.

If it is the milk, then thats something you can easily change. We used Aptamil and didn't seem to have any problems with it.

Hope it gets resolved soon

It does sound as if the HV has been unhelpful

It's just patronising of her to imply the only reason for visiting a gp is get yourself a prescription - what about finding out the cause and taking it from there?

My 4th baby was terribly sick on cow&Gate, plus awfully watery poos, literally she would poo out of her nappy up to her neck! I changed her milk and she didn't do it again. Take lil one to docs just to be safe, but think about trying another formula. Hope it's sorted for you soon.

The midwives and health visitors have all given me conflicting info from before the birth. Then the MW not believing I was in labour and patronising me telling me the induction is quite painful and I should have a bath and calm down (turns out I was 6cm, so got rushed off and couldn't have my water birth) Then the midwives telling me off for shouting too loud while giving birth, leaving me 6 hours on the bed in a pool of blood waiting for someone to see if I needed theater for stitches (I did! lol... fun.)

Now since she was born, we were in hospital for a week, one mw would come in and put a hat on her because her temp was low, another would come in and tell me off for her wearing a hat because she can't regulate her temp. One MW swaddled her, then another comes in and unswaddles her and shows me the "Safe" way to put her to bed. I ask one MW about formula and she says she's not allowed to advise on formula but tells me they are all the same so use the cheapest, then the HV tells me to make sure I keep her on what the hospital started her on so it doesn't bother her tummy. I wanted to use grobags, then the mw told me it's unsafe, then I came home and HV suggested a grobag.... HV at home then tells me to visit the clinic whenever I have questions and want to check weight, then I go to the clinic and get told only to come back if she's unwell... It's no wonder first time mothers have no idea what to do!!.

Mine did the same..... diagnosed with severe reflux. Follow your instincts and see your GP and don't let them fob you off. Mine did. Was a real fight to get her referred for further investigation. Good luck!

Some do genuinely seem to be happy spitters so sick but it doesnt bother them.
It seems reflux will affect baby lying down and sleep.
For example DD wouldnt lie down and sleep until 11m most naps were on me.
I suspect for us it was a soya allergy, she wasnt sick often on bm but was very unsettled.
I also find advice very conflicting.

When we had issues with ds1 throwing up hugely after bottle feeds we eventually realised it was down to the teat. We'd been using v low flow teats and when dh had bought some spares he'd bought faster flow ones by mistake. Eventually we twigged that it was when we used the faster ones he threw up. Got rid of them and no more problems.
It was horrific at the time though and I understand why you're worried op.

I'm sorry you've been made to feel like a neurotic mother. Some health professionals seem to forget that although they deal with babies on a daily basis, everything is new to you.
My Dd would do this too. Not every day, but 3/4 times a week vomit up a huge amount - often I had to change everything that both of us were wearing - and then 5mins later she would be looking for more food.
My dad is a GP (and occasionally seems flippant about my frequent panics) and saw her do it a number of times but said it was nothing to worry about. She didn't projectile, just vomited a lot and was otherwise fine, gaining weight, sleeping etc...
I do think it's right to see a Dr and put your mind at ease, but if your baby is otherwise well/not in distress I think it's ok to comfort yourself with the fact that some babies are just sick more than others.
P.S my Dd grew out of it by about 5 months.

Cockadoodledooo we are on the number one teats, have been since she came out of hospital. (in hospital she was on some yellow sma screw on teats that came with little bottles... she hated them

Figuringitout It's definitely annoying to be fobbed off as worrying. The only thing about the puking that worries me is weight loss and choking. (she never moves her head to the side)

I have a feeling the doc will make me trial other formulas first but we'll see.

since she was sick this morning ive stopped demand feeding her. Her usual was 2/3 ounces every 3 hrs in day and 4 hrs at night. Been waking her for feeds every 2 hours and letting her have 1.5 to 2 ounces and fall asleep. See if regular and smaller feeds help.

Speak of the little devil just brought up her 1.5 ounce feed

Does it distress her or is she not bothered by it? Ds1 would always panic a bit (probably brought on by me panicking ).
I'd definitely get her looked at by someone. But also I think I'd do a comparison - look at the 'blast radius' so to speak of how much comes back when she vomits to such an extent, and then chuck a bottle of the same volume, just drop it (lid off) and see how much it spreads. It's entirely possible that that will go a lot further and she's at least keeping some of the vomited feed down. That was a suggestion from our HV btw. It did work, and certainly made me worry less.

Cockadoodledooo If she was sleeping she will open her eyes in a "wtf was that" kind of response, and she's quickly back to sleep. This morning when the MIL was here she was running around saying "oh dear oh no that's not right", OH was running around looking for a towel and me and baby were just sat there like "oh this again"

When she is distressed/windy/wriggly she never pukes. When she pukes, it's always quiet, no fuss, unexpected!

The liquid test - she definitely is throwing up full feeds or close to. It's still thick and milky, not affected by her insides her, all over her, her face, my clothes, the bed/chair. Sheets always need changing, is full gurgly pukes, brings it up in about 2/3 wrteches. Definitely not spit or me exaggerating how much it can look like :)

DS was exactly the same. FF fed, spectacular amounts of vomit from birth, pretty much every day, sometimes a few times a day. He was diagnosed with reflux at about 12 weeks and was prescribed Domperidone and Ranitidine it helped enormously, although didn't stop it completely. He also had a spotty rash on his face which only disappeared when I changed to soya milk at 1 year. I then changed back to cows milk after a few months as I read so much about soya that wasn't great and rash came back. He also would want more milk immediately after vomiting.

Anyway, DS is now 2.5 and the vomiting really slowed down around at around 2 years although not stopping completely. He has been under various consultants and nothing has ever been found. I would suggest you get an appointment with your gp and get the ball rolling to get a referral to see a paediatrician so that they can eliminate anything or prescribe medication.

HTH

Hi all!

Been to the doctor today, he basically told me HV was full of shit, that Infant gaviscon is advised for over 1 years but docs can prescribe for younger and base it on weight.

He's prescribed that for me and told me to use it for a week and come back and report how she gets on. Bit of trial and error but fingers crossed! :)