5 month old baby struggles to poo??

[PurpleRayne89]

My son is 5 months. Is always screams and arches his back abs kicks his legs trying to pass poop. He’s been doing this since he turned around a month old. He will try all day, wake every hour or more in the night with discomfort and on occasion he will either do it the following morning or the afternoon. Then it starts again, as if he is backed up there is always poop ready to come out. It’s having a huge impact on both of our quality of sleep, some night I only sleep 2-3 hours.

He’s exclusively breastfed. I barely consume dairy. When the poop does come out it’s normal consistency for a BF baby. This is making me anxious about starting solids.

Any similar experiences or advice?

Hi there! Any updates with your baby?

So I’ve had the same issues you describe with my 4 month old and it’s been giving us sleep deprivation as he’s grunting and squirming mostly at night.

He’s had blood and mucus in his stools a month ago so I’ve been dairy free since cause he was assumed to be CMPA. I am starting to doubt it.

Went to a gastro pediatrician and he says it’s infant dud Jesus.

@Twelvestars sorry I hadn’t realised you posted. No notification. He’s 7.5 months and no improvement, he’s been on Movicol which assists in pooping regularly (5 times a week) but he still squirms and grunts and screams. I’ve had to push for a referral. Doctor was trying to convince me it’s colic and normal. Ok, we know infants struggle to poop in the early days but usually clears up by 3-4 months (textbook). However, my son is way beyond those guidelines. To be something isn’t right. He struggled to poop when a small baby when his poop was liquid consistency. Now it’s thicker the issue is much worse.

in your case, it likely won’t go on as long as mine has. Hopefully it clears itself up. Have you seen a GI doctor?

@Twelvestars I forgot to mention that I’m the OP.‘I changed my name.

Did he pass merconium on time? I'm sure I'm spelling that wrong but his first stool.

Yes he did. No issues pooping in the first month actually.

I stopped the Movicol to see what happens and he only pooped once this week, that was Wednesday. So I’ve started it again and expecting an explosion

Ok my son has some issues but one of the give aways for his condition is not going the first time for a while, he took 3 days!

I'd keep pushing to get a referral but we used movovol and lactilose. Orange juice on the morning is good for keeping stuff moving assuming no medical issue. Good luck with him.

I'm not sure why you have movicol when he isn't constipated. I feel like that could cause the opposite issue.

A breastfed baby only pooing once a week, isn't that abnormal.

I just wanted to come back to this, my kids were pulling at me earlier. I always felt something wasnt right with my son and he was exclusively breastfed but just never pooped properly. They kept telling me it was constipation and fine. We kept having more and more movocol and lactilose.

Anyway for my boy it was Hirschprungs. That's rare so unlikely to be what yours does but just if you don't get anywhere I thought I'd share just in case it might help.

@TheAverageUser hello. I hadn’t seen your message. I’ve returned to this thread to provide an update on my now 8 months old son.

so constipation still an issue but gotten progressively worse. I’ve had to up his Movicol dose. Attended paediatric gastro clinic today and as he has had issues stooling since being EBF and explosive poops. They suspect HD. Clinician with discuss with the surgeons next steps and contact me in 4 weeks to discuss testing.

@TheAverageUser how’s things with your baby?

My boy was diagnosed with HD late at 12 months old and he had his surgery there last June.

Have the team suggested you do bowel washouts until they confirm the diagnosis at all?

If it was HD you need to watch for enterocolitis which is a bowel infection, so any explosive poo's , high temperature, low energy or vomiting take him in straight away.

It sounds scary but honestly I was so pleased to finally get a diagnosis because it was a long road of no one believing me when I said something wasn't right and now he's gained loads of weight, poops normally (!), eats and is so high energy.

I'm just putting the kids to bed but if you need anything or support let me know, I've been through it!

Where are you, in the UK? x

@TheAverageUser I can understand how having a diagnosis can finally put things into perspective and an end can be in sight. Just not knowing, it’s difficult to say. The main symptoms are constipation (not being able to go without Movicol) and the explosive poops. He’s in the 50th percentile for both length and weight. No concerns there. It’s difficult to know anything for certain. They haven’t recommended any bowl wash outs. As he has bowel moments on the Movicol. They said to continue doing what i am doing and will touch base in 4-weeks. The consultant is going on annual leave hence the delay. Thank you so much, really kind of you. I am based in London, UK. Yourself?

If you have money to spare I would get a private stool test done, Healthpath in the U.K. are good. Did your child have antibiotics ever? At birth or before it started?

I’ve been down this road, It took a very long time and multiple trips to doctors around the world to heal my son, he is 3.5 now and almost there.

@Poppetlove thanks for responding. Why a private stool test? Yes, he had antibiotics when he was a newborn for conjunctivitis. Why do you ask? What was the issue with your child in the end?

I'm originally from the UK but living in Ireland now.

To diagnose my boy they did a biopsy to test a piece of his bowel to confirm it had no ganglion cells were present. At some point they try to confirm how large the section is that's affected too.

The bowel washouts were needed because he had one year of impaction as it was undiagnosed but also to help prevent enterocolitis. We also had him on antibiotics for the year between diagnosis and surgery.

Antibiotics can wipe a babies (or adults) gut of all the “good bacteria” some kids just cant handle it, it will give you a good indication if this is what happened and what you need to do to repair. Then other things on top of a damaged gut can lead to these difficulties… toxins, overloads, virus etc we went to pretty much every private paediatric gastro consultant in the U.K., then went onward to the USA who weren’t that amazing either. It’s just not something they know huge amounts about.

its really a tricky topic but i did feel we had to very much do our own investigation and research from there attending a consultant only to confirm findings or administer a supplement/medication.

with my child he had antibiotics(for a precaution as cultures were negative), they were strong and definitely wiped his gut.

my child strained to poop, had poop overload (would leak out of nappy if not changed super fast) was irritable etc. it wasn’t normal.

a stool test will give you an indication of what’s going on in there before considering invasive tests. A case of ruling things out some might say…If you did go down that route and decided to make some changes, then you can always do additional tests to check if there is change/improvement.

I seen another poster commented about mucus /blood I did come across papers about that in our research and will respond to that too.

This is a known side effect of rotavirus.
www.medicines.org.uk/emc/files/pil.2739.pdf

When I had this with one of my children the health visitor advised adding a little sugar to some cooled boiled water. It worked. This was over 40 years ago. She survived.

Sorry, just seen that this is an old thread and so my comment is now inappropriate.

@Devpatelslaughingeyes it’s not a problem. At least you tried to contribute 😉

@Poppetlove hey, thought I would come back to this. We have gone ahead and had a private stool test done and an intolerance one too; food and non food items. In addition, going to pay for a private scan to look at the bowel for any bulges / abnormalities. Our next appointment with the NHS September. It will just be another conversation like the initial one. Such a ball ache waiting for so long for nothing to actually be done. I’ll update his results from all private investigations.

@Poppetlove hey, thought I would come back to this. We have gone ahead and had a private stool test done and an intolerance one too; food and non food items. In addition, going to pay for a private scan to look at the bowel for any bulges / abnormalities. Our next appointment with the NHS September. It will just be another conversation like the initial one. Such a ball ache waiting for so long for nothing to actually be done. I’ll update his results from all private investigations.

@Poppetlove hey, thought I would come back to this. We have gone ahead and had a private stool test done and an intolerance one too; food and non food items. In addition, going to pay for a private scan to look at the bowel for any bulges / abnormalities. Our next appointment with the NHS September. It will just be another conversation like the initial one. Such a ball ache waiting for so long for nothing to actually be done. I’ll update his results from all private investigations.

@Poppetlove hey, thought I would come back to this. We have gone ahead and had a private stool test done and an intolerance one too; food and non food items. In addition, going to pay for a private scan to look at the bowel for any bulges / abnormalities. Our next appointment with the NHS September. It will just be another conversation like the initial one. Such a ball ache waiting for so long for nothing to actually be done. I’ll update his results from all private investigations.

@Poppetlove hey, thought I would come back to this. We have gone ahead and had a private stool test done and an intolerance one too; food and non food items. In addition, going to pay for a private scan to look at the bowel for any bulges / abnormalities. Our next appointment with the NHS September. It will just be another conversation like the initial one. Such a ball ache waiting for so long for nothing to actually be done. I’ll update his results from all private investigations.