Very hungry baby

[wobblyknicks]

My dd is 14 weeks at the moment and is starting to take loads of formula. Yesterday she had 36oz and would have had a total of 42 but she brought up some after a couple of feeds. As far as I know this is a lot for her age! She's also on 6 month teats already because she sucked the other ones so hard they just kept collapsing. Even the 6 month ones collapse occasionally but not enough to cause a proper problem.

I definitely don't want to start her on solids, I think its much too early but DH and various people are saying that if she's that hungry we'll have to consider it. I was thinking more of the formula for hungrier babies. She's on Aptamil First at the moment and I don't know what it's called but there's an Aptamil for young babies but ones that are hungrier.

I don't think she's just thirsty because she's still going 4/5 hours between feeds, she just takes a lot at each feed. Also, if she is thirsty how do I tell because she hates plain water.

Basically just need some expert Mumsnet advice!!
What's the main difference between the normal formula and the one for hungrier babies?
Is there more chance of her getting too fat with the 'hungrier' formula?
If she carries on being a hungry baby, when's the earliest to consider solids?
....And any other advice would be hugely appreciated!

Just a thought here - have you tried offering her feeds 3-4 hourly so that she is not as hungry at an individual feed? That way she will get enough milk without being sick. How much milk is she actually taking at a feed?
Hungry formula milk is casein based which means it takes longer to digest than whey based first milk. Babies can become constipated on it but you have done very well to still be on a first milk at 14 weeks. Solids are best not introduced till 4-6 months, the nearer the 6 the better.

Here is a link to the company that produces Aptamil for advice
\linkpmo.milupa.co.uk/asp/show_subject.asp?id=1638&rt=780&ro=2\here}

here

Sorry

thanks mears! If I offer her feeds before she starts crying for one, she hardly takes anything and then is hungry just a short time later and it just gets all messy (ie feeds every couple of hours and she's unsettled all the time). I don't think she's being sick because she's having too much, she's just recently got over a bit of gastroenteritis. Although she's very well in herself now, she still seems to bring up half an oz or so now and again, but it doesn't seem like anything major.

I didn't realise it was good to still be on first milk at the moment. I just assumed that would be enough until she started on solids. So do most babies have to go on to the hugrier milk then? How likely is constipation because she gets a bit from time to time anyway so naturally I'd like to avoid it if possible!

Thanks for the link, just going to look at it now.

Hi Wobbly

My ds was always hungry as a baby, in fact he is still greedy now. He didn't seem to want long between one feed and another and sometimes made himself sick.

My HV told me that some babies just like the feeling of being full and that is why they do it. In my case the food for hungry babies worked, but I didn't know how until I just read Mears' post.

janstar - did the food for hungrier babies have any side effects for yours (eg constipation etc)? Also, would you advise totally switching to that or mixing it ie, one feed whey, next casein, next whey etc?

I don't remember him ever being constipated. I think I introduced the hungrier milk by mixing it with the normal milk, gradually increasing the ratio until it was all hungry milk. But don't know if that was really the right thing to do. Perhaps Mears or someone else might know.

You're HV should be able to advise. I was taught - many years ago- that the milk should just be switched over all at once. Not sure if that is correct thinking now though.

ok, thanks!

just as another side question - why do people spend £'s on baby books by one expert who's so far up their own b**cks that they don't actually know what's good for babies anymore when you can subscribe to Mumsnet and get great (balanced and tried & tested) advice for nowt?

(long live Mumsnet!)

thanks mears - posts crossed!!

My HV is a bit pathetic though, she never knows anything about ANYTHING. All she's good for is weighing dd and that's just about all she can cope with (and so naturally I don't trust her as far as I can throw her!....would really like to throw her somewhere!) so who else would be good to ask?

Wobblyknicks, I started a similar thread to yours a while back about my ds because he was taking between 37-40 oz of formula at around 14 weeks. He just seemed to love his milk and I was reassured by the advice I got here on Mumsnet, especially from those who said their babies had even more than this. Having said this, ds did sleep 7 pm - 7 am with a half hour feed at 10.30 pm from 8 weeks and then right through 12 hours at 13 weeks so looking back I don't know what I was fretting about really I contemplating changing ds onto hungry baby milk, but in the end I just stuck with what he was having and he is still on that now (Omneo Comfort). Ds is now just coming up to 6 months and since starting solids he has gradually reduced his milk intake down to approx 21 ozs.
You don't say how much your dd weighs? If she is reasonably content between feeds on this amount of milk personally I would keep going as you are and hopefully you can push through to four months before introducing solids. I started my ds on a tiny amount of baby rice once a day at 14 weeks and my hv was very supportive of this decision.
HTH

Thanks melly! DD will sleep for a long time at night, like you were saying about yours. She'll sleep for 12 hours before waking up and I thought that was too long so I've been waking her up after about 9 hours but maybe I don't need to. Will definitely speak to HV (and try and get some sense out of her!). DD is usually content between her feeds (just straight afterwards she seems a little bit fretful so I wonder if she'd drink more if it was there). She weighed 11lb 2 weeks ago, we've still got to have her weighed again soon. I don't know if it makes any difference, but she's on a lower centile to the one she was born on because she lost a lot of weight at the start, so could this be her putting it back on?

Did your ds have any side effects from starting him on the baby rice? Did that make a big difference to him? With all the current recommendations, I'm just worried that dd isn't mature enough to handle any solids.

I don't think ds suffered any ill effects from starting on solids at 14 weeks, but I suppose only time will tell. It was something that wasn't planned and he slept through the night before starting so I didn't do it to get him to sleep longer or anything. I did take things very, very slowly though, I am talking a tiny amount of baby rice once a day and he continued on that until he was four months and we then started to increase accordingly. I think he is now having less than my dd did at the same age and she was a lot smaller. I have kept him on pureed veg and fruit and only now at 6 months started introducing other things i.e protein etc.
I would keep going with your dd as you are, especially as she is less than 12 lbs. Try not to worry about the volume of milk she has, this will dramatically decrease once weaning does commence.
Good luck with whatever you decide to do

I'm now worried! I didn't think that it was too abnormal for dd to have between 30 and 36 oz a day. HV didn't seem bothered. dd is only 6 weeks tomorrow, but does weigh a 12lbs as of last tuesday.
Should I double check this ?

The difference between the 'normal' milk and milk for hungrier babies is which part of the cow's milk it is made from. Not a 100% sure on which is which just repeating what HV told me
DS2 was very hungry baby, SMA white suited him brilliant.

myers the cat - mine is not yet 4 weeks (weighs about 9.5 lbs) and eats between 30 and 34 oz per day. that seems like a lot to me, but maybe it is normal after all if yours is similar!

Leading on from this: a question about breastfed babes (where obviously you can't see how much is going in). My dd2 is 14 weeks (I think) but hasn't read the books that say she should be spacing her feeds out longer and longer - it's under three hours, usually. Which is worrying me slightly mainly because of going back to work, expressing, etc. Don't know if she's getting smaller feeds more frequently, or how to space them out without starving her, or what. It is actually perturbingly me quite a bit, to the point where dp and I had massive row about it and he said I ought to see a shrink

i don't know how much ds used to drink- breastfed up to 4 mo, but about constipation- he did get it whenever milk changed since he's on the bottle. it settled after few days. if everything seems to be fine i wouldn't worry too much about the amount, as it was said babies don't read books and when breastfed you don't really know how much they eat. good luck!

MI - can you give me some idea of when he feeds ? Does he still feed at night ?

Pupuce - she's a girl!

She doesn't feed at night, hurrah, or rather I feed her about 10.30ish or later, and then she feeds some time from 5am or later (6am today and a couple of times before). Then I'm aiming for a feed between 7 and 7.30 (because that's when she'll be off to our very good childminder); after that she usually goes for a feed at 10ish, around 12.30 and around 3. Those are the feeds that slightly concern me although I realise I'm probably stressing about nothing. I'm not worried about feeding her after about 5.30 as we're home and I'm happy to feed solidly if she wants it!

I would really have loved it if she'd gone for four hours between feeds, so that I was providing an 11am and a 3pm feed. It isn't to be. What I don't know is whether she's getting the same amount overall as she would with two feeds (I think this may well be the case as she doesn't actually feed for very long).

If all else fails she can be supplemented with formula chez childminder, it's just that I'm not overly keen on the stuff and dd1 kicked up rough something chronic when introduced to it. In the meantime I have a freezer full of frozen milk, anyway!

HTH - all suggestions appreciated!

Princess, phew....glad someone else has a little chomper too!
Because I stopped breast feeding as she seemed to be almost constantly feeding - I really wasn't sure! I could express 4-6 ounces fairly consistently so she must have been eating for england then too!

mine has just downed 7 oz in a feed which is an all time record...
where does he put it?!

my baby is also 14 weeks and very hungry. She takes sma white (for hungrier babies) but was still getting hungry so we have started giving her baby rice at last feed this satisfies her and she sleeps longer!!!!!
Health visitor wasnt too pleased that I had started weaning but every baby is different and it is ridiculous to say wait until 16 weeks when you have a hungry baby.

MI - Can you express at work ?

In their nappy....!!

Mine is strangely quiet this evening. No doubt that will change in the next hour or so. She doesn't normally last this long. Must have been the walk by the sea front!
We did that Friday and she downed 9oz v. quickly then slept it off!

PPH My DS is the same age as yours, 4 weeks, and I was sort of following the suggested amounts/times in the GF book. However this only goes to 4 weeks, and I think that it's not enough for DS as I have had to give him more in his afternoon feeds.

When/how much are you giving yours?
What about through the night? GF suggests a 2 oz feed in the night but this is never enough for mine. He fed at 11 (5oz), 3(3oz) and 6.30 (5oz)last night. How does this compare to yours?

DS has reflux so am very wary of over feeding him and I reckon he'd probably take whatever I put in the bottle.....

BR
PS. He gained 1 lb and 1 1/2 oz in one week, so he's not exactly starving.!!