5 month old dd seems really intolerant of formula - any suggestions???

[amijee]

Hello there,

I'm not sure anyone can help or has had a similar experience.

My dd3 was exclusively bf until 2-3 wks ago. I had a gastric bug and felt very dehydrated and decided to give her formula for her daytime feeds as I am due to go back to work soon anyway. Admittedly, it was quite sudden and I weaned my other DC off gradually one feed every few days.

She currently has a bf 7pm, 11.30pm, 3am and 7.30am. In the day she will have 3 bottles but never more than 7-8 oz in total.

She takes to the bottle fine and knows what to do but just does not want very much of it and then proceeds to be very unhappy and uncomfortable and possets a lot. Her poos in the day are also weird - they are very watery without any of the "mustard seed" you get from breast milk.

However, the biggest problem is at night. She is woken up by wind/pain and often screams out and this is followed by a fart and she may settle and start again. Also she is frequently dooing a BIG poo after the night breast feeds which is obviously a pain to have to change her at this age ( sometimes twice overnight!)

As I said, don't know if anyone else has had these experiences with mixed feeding but any advice/thoughts would really be appreciated.

PS - i give her aptamil in the day, but I don't think the brand is relevant. Also she is not yet weaned on to solids

You don't say whether you are winding her after the bottles. Some babies who don't need wining after breastfeeds may need winding after bottles.
That might help with the possetting/wind/discomfort.

You say she isn't having much - how much? Don't worry about what the packet says, go with what you think she wants.

Hope you have a better time tonight x

The brand may well be relevant. My DS didn't tolerate Aptamil well and had very watery poos. He was fine on SMA however. Honestly, once I changed formula his poos became much more normal. I would try a different formula.

thanks so much for your replies.

sleapless - I am fanatical about winding - for both breast and bottle so i dont think its that. The max she has in one go is 3oz, sometimes as little as 1oz when she hasn't fed for 3-4 hrs.

scarabeetle - that's very interesting. I will try some SMA tomorrow. I remember I did a taste test for my ds1 when i had to start formula and he went for SMA! Bur dd2 liked aptamil out of the ready made cartons! ( typical expensive taste of a girl!)

will let you know!

Good luck! I hope you see a difference.

are you using the aptimil readymade cartons for each feed? They always made my DD very uncomfortable. She would take a whole bottle of powdered milk but would grump and grumble with carton milk. i used to have to mix a dose of gripe water in with it to make it drinkable for her. DD had terrible wind to start with but the cartons always seemed so full of air bubbles and frothy.

Maybe you could try making the milk up from the powder and see how she goes? or try mixing the gripe water with it.