Can you help with my formula/ Dr Brown problem?

[kanna]

Has anyone else had this problem. My little girl is 13 weeks and has been miserable all week with very upset stomach. She has been very windy from the very start but the Dr Brown bottle, colief drops and special colic formula milk (from 6 weeks) seem to work resulting in only a few long crying spells.

She seems to have outgrown the Level 1 teat as she really sucks too hard to get the milk out.

Last Monday and 10 days before that I moved the teat up to level 2 (advised for babies 3 months +)the milk is now free flowing and even with plenty of winding it gives her a very upset stomach. I don't really want to go back to level 1 as she is sucking so hard her lips are quite sore.

I'm a first time mum so I could be over reacting. I had a bad experience early on when I was trying out different milks and her upset stomach led to bad nappy rash which took a good month to clear as her skin is quite sensitive.

Should I switch bottles, milks, perservere. Please advise.

Has anyone else had this problem. My little girl is 13 weeks and has been miserable all week with a very upset stomach. She has been very windy from the very start but the Dr Brown bottle, colief drops and special colic formula milk (from 6 weeks) seem to work resulting in only a few long crying spells and no tummy problems.

She seems to have outgrown the Level 1 teat as she really sucks too hard to get the milk out.

Last Monday and 10 days before that I moved the teat up to level 2 (advised for babies 3 months+)the milk is now free flowing and even with plenty of winding it gives her a very upset stomach. I don't really want to go back to level 1 as she is sucking so hard her lips are quite sore.

I'm a first time mum so I could be over reacting. I had a bad experience early on when I was trying out different milks and her upset stomach led to bad nappy rash which took a good month to clear as her skin is quite sensitive.

Should I switch bottles, milks, perservere. Please advise.

If she suffers from wind badly I would stick to the dr brown bottles, nothing even comes close to help relieve the wind, other bottles made my babies so much worse.

I don't really have ant advice with regards to the teat flow,

how many ounces is she having?

could you do an ounce then wind her? and repeat until full?

you sound like you are doing wonderfully though :)

I had similar problems - mum told me that in the 70s the teats didn't have holes at all - you had to make your own. Is it possible you can ever so slightly enlarge the size 1 hole so it's just a little bigger, but not as big as the size 2?

My ds2 was very windy baby and like you I changed bottles to dr brown, changed milk, used infacol and even tried gripe water!

I do tend to think that it sometimes it can be tempting to keep changing what you are doing and never persevere until things settle. Having said that maybe the colic formula and the drops are too much both together. Have you tried just this formula in the dr b bottles with no drops?

Personally I wouldn't change the bottles as they are very good.
Also with the colic formula it is often thicker so needs a bigger hole to flow through without blocking off. She will quickly adapt to the new flow and not suck as hard as she has had to with the level 1 teats.

Unfortunately this is going to be the beginning of many things to worry about with new baby! I am expecting dc4 and find as you chill out about one problem another issue raises it's ugly head! Just go one feed at a time and enjoy!

Thank you for your advice, yesterday I made the teat slightly bigger with a needle and it seems to be a good compromise. The milk is going doing a little faster but she can cope. I'm being very careful to make sure the expanded hole is cleaned thoroughly. She is incredibly hard to wind. Someone said I should use gripe water after the feed. What do you think?

My ds was really bad with wind when he was a baby. He had wind/tummy trouble up until he was weaned really. He was on prescription formula and all sorts. It was such an awful stressful time.

We used dr browns too. We found that we had to keep changing from infacol,colief etc as one seemed to work for a while then stopped and we'd change. I personally found gripe water the best.

I would say to persevere with what your doing. As long as your dd is happy and putting on weight etc. It wont be long until you can introduce solids. Once my ds was on solids he was fine.

What formula are you using? Is it a prescription one?

Aptamil easy digest coupled with Dr.Brown's bottles worked wonders for my DD.

She is having Aptamil easy digest. Glad to hear it works for others. I think I will give the gripe water a go this week as winding is getting quite difficult and really dragging out her feed. The good thing is she has quite appetite!

I used to wind DD by 'sitting' her up and supporting her with one hand whilst rubbing/patting her back with the other- was much better than over the shoulder.

It may help?

kanna - I just wanted to let you know that it will all pass - and given that she's 13 weeks now you should be out of the woods any day now! :) My son had terrible colic at first and I used to dread early evenings - these days he's captain fartypants and does a nice line in burps too!

I found the burping method described by tethearse really helped too - it seemed to really calm him wheras when he was over my shoulder he'd still have time to beat his little fists and wriggle.