windy bf baby driving me mad

[pipoca]

DD is 8 wks tomorrow and apart from about 3 (small) bottles of formula, once in hospital and a couple of times since we've been home when I've been desperate in the middle of the night.
She fed well at the beginning and at about 6 weeks would do 10pm til 3am ish but in the last week or so she's had terrible wind, big wet burps, farting and possetting a lot. She now does 10pm til 1.30am and seems to spend a lot of the day screaming with wind.
I think I have fast let down (been on kellymom) as she gulps, chokes and makes clicking noises and then comes off choking and I drip like mad for a minute or two. I've tried feeding lying down but she's no better, worse if anything. She takes maybe 2 hours to settle after most feeds, altho other times she drops straight off and sleeps for a couple of hours.
The couple of times she's had formula, she glugs it down, belches loudly and goes straight to sleep. I've just got over a d and v bug, have a challenging 3 yr to look after and now have bronchitis and I'm really reaching the end of my tether and really tempted by the idea that she might feed and fucking well go to sleep settle easier. I tried infacol and all that stuff last time with DS and it just gave him the runs as far as I could see.
Something's got to give, I'm going slowly mad.

sorry, I mean apart from about 3 bottles of formula she's ebf.

sorry, drip feed..keep thinking of things. The other thing that tempts me to ff is that she takes it really quick and drops off whereas bf inevitably takes a good hour and then she often won't settle.

Infalcol is crap, try colief, expensive but it actually works. I think it is £9 for a titchy bottle but a little goes a long way.

Have you been in touch with a BF counsellor yet? Maybe you should give them a call and get someone round who can watch you feed and help you?

Sorry you are having such a crummy time.

i don't ive in the uk and there's no real bf help and support here (spain)

Spain has very high BF numbers I think, so it might be worth trying to find out from your hospital or DR what support there is?

Have you looked at youtube clips for alternative ways to hold/feed windy babies?

there are some groups but only once a month and everything shuts all summer and the groups don't run again til september.

When she's having a bad go of the wind I can keep her upright for aaaaages and she won't burp, I try all the positions to burp her, nothing so I put her down cos she's dropped off and the minute I put her down she starts flailing and crying.

Are you sure it's wind? A baby who snuggle off to sleep when held and then cries and flails when put down is more likely just saying 'I want to be close to you and I don't like it when I am not'.

I don't see anything in your post that says 'wind', sorry....babies do burp loudly, babies do fart, and babies do possett, and some babies do all of this a lot.

OTOH, maybe the choking and gulping is a sign she has probs coping with a fast let down - hard to tell. LLL is in Spain, and you may be able to find English speaking help if you need it. They would be a good resource for you, I think. They'd help you decide if the settling difficulty you describe is just your baby wanting to be held a lot, and give you some practical ideas on how to do this and get on with other things.

www.laligadelaleche.es/

LLL don't have any meetings in my part of Spain. I don't need english speaking help, I'm fine in Spanish. I do think it's wind as she'll go to sleep after a feed and then start flailing and grunting in her sleep with eyes tight shut and then do a big fart and relax.

I have a ring sling but it's 40 degrees here at the mo so too hot for that, and to be honest too hot to even hold her all that much. Not that formula would help any of that of course...just with having had the d and v and now having bronchitis I am feeling really shit and low. i coped ok with the crying til I got ill but I just can't handle the fussing and crying all the time now and the broken nights. The nights aren't even that bad, she'll go at worst 10pm til 1am then til 5 or 6, I'm just so very tired and run down at the moment. Sorry...rambling now.

There are colectivo la leche meetings once a month here, next one is next Friday so I might try to get to one and see what they think about the choking, gulping, clicking thing.

Also, when i do pick her up she just screams and screams and screams so I don't think it's just that she wants to be held. If I feed her she pukes it all back up and the cycle starts again. With formula the couple of times she's knocked it back, burped and gone to sleep..so in the night when I'm feeling rough it's tempting.

Sounds rough, pipoca :(

Hope you get help from LLL - do they have a phoneline you can ring?

Babies can be disturbed by the need to fart and relaxed when it comes :) and this doesn't mean anything really.

Maybe she gets uncomfortable in the heat and maybe this is part of why she gets upset?

There are ways to hold her and use a sling which don't make you too hot...there are mesh slings, or lightweight slings, for example, and plenty of mothers in hot climates use them (try some of the Australian baby product sites to see what's made).

Tiktok has some great advice, but I bet what you need OP is a bit of a break! Is there anyone who could take your baby for you for a couple of hours so you can go off and sleep? I would be very happy to do this for a friend even if the baby cried a lot when they were with me. Often people don't know you are struggling until you call out.

make sure you are eating and drinking well, and when you can get some rest. Do you have a partner, are they pitching in?

DH helps but he needs to look aftr DS and do the shopping, cooking etc. Funnily enough we went out last night to a thing in the town square for kids and DD was happy in her pram kicking her legs and looking around and then fed at 10pm and 1130 and then slept til 5.30am!!!! . she's fed well today and is currently sleeping, wind (and it IS wind that makes her cry) seems much better today. Feel much better. thanks to everyone for suggestions, going to stick it out with bf and take each day as it comes.

xx

I can't help, but my almost 3 week old DD has dreadful wind and it does make things hard, so you have my sympathy. I have tried Infacol, but it doesn't seem to work and ours seems also to be caused by fast let down/oversupply. DS2 was very windy/colicky and it got better after 3 months, so I'm hoping DD will improve by then.

My EBF 2 month old is the same - she got the nickname Windy Bob in hospital and she's still the same now! It's definitely wind with her too (def not heat - I live in the Frozen North). Some days she's better than others but it does get you down in the night when you just can't even tilt her backwards to put her in the cot, let alone actually tuck her in. I've found that sitting her on my lap, tilting her forwards onto one hand and patting her back gets up the big ones (sometimes I bounce my knee a bit too), then I put her on my shoulder for the smaller ones.... Sometimes I'm just doing this in a perpetual loop for what feels like hours! I just keep telling myself it'll be different next week... or the one after... Hang in there!

Your DD could be having a reaction to something you are eating as well. My DD (now 17 months) had quite bad reflux for the first 6-7 months however I managed to keep it mostly under control (I say mostly, she still threw up everywhere regularly and screamed a hell of a lot) with my diet. The advice I was given was that anything you eat that could make you windy will do the same to the baby, and if they are reflux prone it's worse. I also tried cutting out dairy and caffeine which made a big difference. Something to consider..

do without tea and coffee????? No, please, it's the only thing keeping me sane!! With DD it's the farts that really bother her I think (and she does some really loud ones). midori infacol is crap, does nothing...tried it with DS and it just seemed to give him the runs, so not bothering this time.
I think I just have to stick it out, we've had a good day today and we'll see how we go tomorrow. It's just hard when they're crying and you've tried everything but can't comfort them.

Wow Pipoca how are you getting on now, it sounds like you've been having a bit of a challenging time. Did you go to the LLL meeting? x

Hi Amanda, are you still waiting or now ttcing? No, I couldn't go to any meetings cos everything stops here (Southern Spain) all July and August, so there are no meetings to go to.
Had a dreadful night last night...I slept 12-2.30 then DD awake 2.30 til almost 4am screaming with wind (woke DS in the process) then DD awake again 5.25. and DS up at 7am. bleurgh.

Hi, is she bothered with wind all the time or just during the night?
Ds2 was hellish with wind during the night. At 4am every day he'd grunt/wriggle/cry/whine for 2hrs, sometimes in his sleep, but we got no sleep from 4-6 for weeks as a result. After he had a few big hard farts he was fine and settled down again.
We started to focus on winding him for ages after each feed, til we could wind no more! It made a bit of a difference, but I think time was the main factor - he gradually just grew out of it. Like you, I wanted to throw in the towel, but we tried giving formula at 10pm instead of bfeeding. It helped us a lot. He seemed more settled. And it meant dh had a go of feeding him while I had a break or a nap. He's 8m now, still has formula at bedtime, and 2 breastfeeds a day. It's all worked out fine.
Id also try taking her out in her pram in the evening again, see if that helps, or whether it was a coincidence that she slept better a couple of nights ago. The bouncing of the pram might have dispersed the trapped wind?
Best of luck.

Oh still waiting of course, we're planning some travelling and DH wants to get a new car, so it's looking like it's going to be at least another 10 months. Me waiting to TTC is becoming one of those MN things like the bat!

I'm sorry to hear you are having a difficult time. I hope someone is able to give you some helpful advice.

How does DS like his new little sister?

OP, you mentioned that she liked being out in the pram. Are you managing to get out each day? Is she settled when she's out?

OP for a fast let down and/or wind problems the bf consultant I saw recommended the saddle hold. I used this as I had a fast let down which made ds very sicky after a feed (and me very grr at being covered in milk that had taken almost an hour to get down him!) and because we got a less painful latch this way.

what's the saddle hold?