15 wk Baby dropping centiles - do I stop BF?

[doubleshotlatte]

Please help - confused and worried.
I've EBF'ed DD till 6 mths then mixed-fed til 1 yr (she's now 3) and felt so confident with EBF DS (15 wks). We started so well and he was steadily on the 75th centile. He's now less than 50th :( dropping more than a centile in 4 weeks.

Here's the background - He feeds every 2-3 hrs for 10-15 mins including nights (no sleep for me!). Not long, I know, but he has always fed this way and my let-down is quite forceful i.e. when expressing, bottle fills up fast. Both my babies were quite windy/needing lots of burping. He was such a very happy baby, very strong, held his head up almost from birth, is already rolling over. Looks chunky, healthy (that's probably going to change now :( )

Since a week or so, our pattern changed. He keeps coming off the breast and looking up at me or around not feeding as well as he used to. He has also gone from poos every 3 days or so to pooing every day. And has been more windy if possible. The only things that have changed are

• I might be drinking 1 extra coffee a day
• he's teething (drooling, chewing).
• he was immunised 3 wks ago
• its been very hot
• we took him swimming in a big public pool

DS spits up loads (DD never did) HV thinks it might be silent reflux and suggests Gaviscon. Is breastmilk making him windy? Will things improve if I mixed fed? Should I cut out coffee? We tried formula once or twice, it made him constipated.

By the way, I would welcome advice from those who formula feed too.

Sure others will be along shortly but I think moving 1-2 centile bands is considered normal and if he seems healthy then there's definitely no reason to stop BF at all. Could be mildly under the weather or it could be the jabs?

Maybe also he is going through a distractible phase so is feeding less because the world's so interesting.

Also re the drooling - my son is a drooler extraordinaire but it always gets about 10x worse when he has oral thrush. Any chance your DS could have it?

Thanks narmada I will look in his mouth for thrush though I've not had much luck with looking before

Nothing in your post suggests anything other than a normal healthy baby growing and developing well - no need to pathologise by diagnosing reflux...on the info here, anyway.

• in healthy babies, a drop of up to two centiles is within normal. Even more than that is almost always physiological ie how the baby is 'meant' to be, but prob should be checked out and more breastfeeding done if needed
• shorter feeds are normal in older babies - they are 'hardwired' to feed in shorter burts both because they are more efficient and also because older babies take an interest in the world and thus spend less time feeding
• it is normal for poo behaviour to change at any time - both ways ie less and more frequent. In a healthy baby this is insignificant
• drooling is normal in babies of this age

I don't know how anyone diagnoses 'windy' or 'more windy' as there is no test for this that I know of :)

If for some reason you think your baby needs more calories, then you have the calories in your breasts already :) Offer him more feeds if you want - if he needs them he'll take them.

Hope this helps - obv if you have any concerns about his health you'll ask your HV or doc.

He may just be evening out to what will be a natural weight for him. Is he still gaining weight overall?

Jabs, teething and the heat could all be reasons why he's a bit distractable whilst feeding. Also as Narmada says, the world is a very interesting place right now with loads of distractions. DD would occasionally go through phases where she seemed a bit off her milk but it passes in a few days, I would hang in there and try not to worry too much.

I always found that DD fed better at night in the dark. Sometimes in the day I did need to take her in a quiet room and close the curtains; she did seem to feed better in the peace and quiet. Although it was just a phase and it did pass.

Keep your chin up, it sounds like you are doing a fantastic job of feeding your bouncing baby boy. :)

Second what others have said re distractability. I remember thinking something was wrong in the third month, after a while i realised ds just wasn't feeding like a newborn anymore.

Maybe your ds is just adjusting his centile or will put lots of weight on at a later spurt.

My DS dipped at about the same age ? he didn?t quite go a centile, but nearly ? he then piled it all back on again (and more) a couple of months later.. Distractableness (if that?s a word!) is normal for that age, they are starting to discover the world around them, and jabs, teething and heat will also have had an affect on his general behaviour. Assuming he?s alright in himself I wouldn?t worry too much, just keep feeding as much as he wants it :)

Thanks Tiktok those were the answers I needed and kinda what I wanted to hear re "feed more often" I'm even thinking of eating more calories myself to help. I'm not so sure its reflux either but we'll see .

Do you think it will help if I offered just hind milk (non-full boob)? Or will that leave him thirsty in this weather (without the foremilk)? Please, if you're still around (why doesn't MN have those @ mentiony things)

Great I just had a playdate for DD with a boy whose Mum thought DS was smaller than her son was at his age . Perfect.

Thanks! Yesmynameis That's just it! He does feed better at night when we're both relaxed. Its my "special time" with him, we cuddle and are in bliss during feeds, the oxytocin buzzing all around :o So now I just have to replicate that in the daytime with irritable preschooler around

I don't think you can engineer whether they get foremilk or hindmilk, and I don't think it's a good idea to try. Nothing you have said about your DS would worry me at all though. Mine was 75th centile at birth and under the 25th by 4 months - but he was always happy and healthy, and gaining weight.

Thanks moonface and cosmosis its really helpful to know you've been there too. Perhaps its a 3 month thing. Really hope he piles it back on. Or else MIL will put him on formula (or bug me to tears about it).

RitaMorgan but I think I read on Kellymom that you could (i.e. offer hindmilk, or a less full breast)?

Do you mean just by feeding more frequently? Or by block feeding (repeatedly offering just one side at subsequent feeds)?

I still think it's a good idea to be lead by your baby - letting them finish one side and then offering the other. If you start block feeding you could end up reducing your supply and frustrating the baby. If he needs more milk then just feeding as often as possible and offering both sides is the best way to do that imo.

Ah ok, I didn't know that was called block feeding. DD more or less fed only from one breast but DS managed to make the "difficult" boob work (proud momma emoticon) so theoretically she would have got more fatty milk but don't think she did .

No, I think on kellymom they were suggesting you express/pump off some of the milk from an engorged breast to get to the hindmilk sooner. I can't see that working TBH.

Ah, I get you. I don't know, seems like a lot of faff to me for a problem that might not even be a problem. If he's happy and healthy I'd just keep doing what you're doing and maybe have him weighed again in a month.

Total faff, not necessary, unlikely to make any difference at all....and no need to eat more calories yourself as this will definitely not make any difference.
No need to do anything, in fact, unless you are sure there is a problem, and honestly, there doesn't seem to be :)