3 month old won't feed.

[nearlymumofone]

My 3 month old who has been breast fed and given the odd bottle of expressed milk refuses to feed most of the time. Today for example woke at 7am, fed for about 5 minutes, then at 1030am for about 30 seconds, 2pm for 5 minutes, 5pm for 5 minutes then at 6pm fed for 45 minutes as if he was starving. Sometimes he never has a big feed just 5-10 minutes max every 3 hours. He is so easily distracted that the slightest noise/movement while he is being fed and he finishes feeding in favour of looking around, and it is impossible to get him to go back on. He is breast fed but I have tried expressing and giving a bottle, 9 times out of 10 he refuses this or just takes an ounce.

For the first 6 weeks he slept and ate really well, since then it's been pretty much like this. I've asked advice from the doctor/health visitor and they have mixed reactions- the GP said breastfed babies are notoriously difficult, the health visitor found it really strange but offered no help or advice.

He went through a stage of not gaining weight/gaining very little weight. The health visitor referred me to the Gp, who was not concerned. However at his last weigh in he'd gained over half a pound.

Has anyone else experienced this? Does it get any better? Is there anything i can try to help him?

Thanks!!

if he is gaining, then he is getting enough. he might just have got very efficient. this is good.

your gpis speaking shite btw! all bablie vary regardless of how they are fed.

i went through a stage of taking ds2 somewhere quiet which helped, but if he is well, gaining weight and alsert, then nothing to worry about.

It's not unnormal for babies to become difficult to feed during the day, so I wouldn't worry if weight, alertness and output were still good.

Two common reasons are
(1) they realise there is an outside world and get distracted leading to more feeds are night (can lead to reverse cycling)
(2) teething - want to feed but hurts them thought if he doesn't come off crying I'm guessing not
oh and (3) could be a growth spurt coming up, quite common for babies to get fussy around these.
I'm sure there are other reasons. If it keep up you can google kellymom and fussy eating.

Maybe hold off bottles for a while until he's back to normal a bit more. Oh just read that he doesn't take much so scrub that.

If it's (1) which it sounds like it is, then going somewhere with no distractions can help (no telly, maybe even darkened room). DH can't be around me when I'm feeding DD even now at 9 months. I also can't feed out and about unless I go to the bathroom or somewhere private. Maybe lying in your bed for an hour so he snacks on/off might help. That way you don't have to hold him and feel pressured to either do or don't do the feed. (which I'm aware prob doesn't make sense)

I was just about to write the exact same post and thought I'd scan through existing threads and found yours.

DD is just over 3 months and has always been a fairly quick feeder but I always felt she was taking a good feed. Recently she will feed for 3-5 mins then that's it for 3 hours. Sometimes she will go 3.5 hours on this amount of milk. Over the last couple of days it's become apparent that she's not getting enough milk as she's been grouchy after 2.5 hours so I've been offering her a bottle after BF as she doesn't get as distracted with that - she just wants to look around all the time and can't do that while BFing.

It's quite annoying but it's making me want to give up BFing as I'm sick of wondering whether she's hungry and she's gone from being a fab sleeper to waking up all the time and I don't want to get in to the night snacking cycle - got a very active 2 year old to look after as well and very interrupted sleep isn't working for me!

Going to see HV on Mon to see what she suggests....

My 4 month old is the same - very distractible, getting a decent feed out of her is a nightmare - getting her weighed tomorrow to see if it's cause a problem or not. If it has we may well do some hardcore baby mooning....

I put an answer on your other thread...