Bf and weight gain slowing down

[CuriosityCola]

Sorry if this has been asked before.

Ds was steadily following the 50th percentile, but his weight gain has slowed down...only 2oz gained last week. He is 16 weeks old and has taken to snacking during the day for 5-10 mins and having larger feeds during the night.

Health visitor said he has reversed and that my milk supply will be suffering in the day. To fix things I need to offer him a feed every two hours for 30 mins. If he doesn't feed for that time to express to boost my supply. Whilst doing this I should gradually unlatch him quicker and quicker during the night and get him to sleep without breast.

I am feeling overwhelmed at trying to express every two hours. I never get much pumping anyway. I have had a really positive experience until now. I think we are also going through 4 month sleep regression.

Now I have rambled I'm not even sure what my question is. There must be an easier way help!

It's scary that such differing advice is given. I think I will just carry on as I have been doing. Going to try and offer the chance of a feed more during the day.

The two hourly suggestion was to increase feeds in the day.

mummyGemx feeding less frequently is bad for supply

Ds1 was on the 95th percentile when he was born. No-one could believe quite how big he was as I'm average height 5'4" and (outside pregnancy) weigh 7 and a half stone. He was the biggest baby anyone in my extended family or dp's family had ever produced.

Over the first year he fell from the 95th percentile to just below the 25th. He was always super healthy, never ill, just didn't put on weight in the way that the charts would suggest that he should. He is now 6, still super healthy and super skinny. He is very active and looks just like I did as a child. He was just born too big for where he was going to end up.

My little one did drop after birth but regained birth weight quickly she has just put on much more slowly than the curves suggest and so has dropped down everytime I go. She has never lost weight since the initial drop after birth - always put on just slowly. She looks healthy is very strong and alert. I am just trying to feed her for longer and offer the other boob more often even if she seems to have finished. She will only drink formula for my husband and only a small amount so might get him to give her a little bit in the evenings but quite honestly I dont think it will make much difference and I dont want to have supply problems as bottle feeding will be a battle as she clearly prefers to breast feed. If only breastfeeding was simple! x

There has been recent research to suggest that excess maternal fluids during labour/c-section can lead to the baby appearing to lose lots of weight when in fact they aren't they are just weeing out the excess fluid. This separate research says the same thing.

Excess fluid can also lead to delays in milk coming in mothers which could compound the problem (but I can't find the study now ).

An alternative is that the placenta functions very well and baby grows so well that they are bigger than genetics would suggest.

My own personal spin on this that I had high blood pressure with DD1 & DD2 (my highest recorded BP was 150/105 when I was 8 weeks with DD1), I didn't have pre-eclampsia I just had consistantly high reading (usually about 130-140/80-90). DD1 was 7lb 12oz (but was induced and I had a tonne of fluids), DD2 was born at home and was 7lb 6oz.

In DD3's pg I frequently had BP of 110/60 or even lower - I had difficulty getting up as I felt faint and going up stairs was hazardous! - and she was 8lb 10oz. DD3 is also now my smallest toddler (she wore a 3-6m skirt yesterday even tough on 50th%ile for height & weight)

If high BP can lead to growth restriction, why can the reverse not be true - low BP leading to higher weight gain? As far as I know there is no medical backing to this just my pondering.

CuppaTea - DD3's weight gain was great to start with (dropped down to 75th%ile from 91st but was following it well) but when she got bronchiolitis, her weight gain just plateaued and she gain 2lb between 8w and 26w - 11lb 4 to 13lb 4 instead of being 17lb 10 if she had continued to follow the 75th%ile. She was 17lb 13 at 12m, had only gain 9lb in her first year and has only now at 2y tripled her birth weight and is 25lb 15.

Sorry that was bit rambly epic

Interesting links Truthsweet. I had no iv drip - do you think the ice lollies I was scoffing between contractions may have counted!!!

I like your BP theory - mine was down to 80/55 at one point!

There has to be more to it than what they know now. Someone should do more research. The babies that lose lots of weight make more sense to me - how can a newborn survive on nothing but colostrum for three days and only lose an ounce?!!

Thats interesting TruthSweet as I had lower blood pressure for all 3 of my pregnancies and all 3 babies dropped centiles! I did move to bottle with my two boys alot earlier as I was worried. This time though my little girl is not having any of it - she likes her breast milk!!!

Babies are born with energy stores to tide them over especially if they don't have the cord cut early (they get something like an extra 1/3 blood volume if cord cutting is delayed until it stops pulsing/placenta is delivered - average 108mls).

The concern is if they are expending lots of energy ineffectively feeding and not getting much in return their weight will drop past the magical 10%. If they are inflated with fluid they will lose weight quickly but it will be just like going on a crash diet and losing 7lbs in one week - it's just water not fat that has been lost.

Colostrum has 55kcals per 100ml (vs around 75mls for mature milk

My last dd was early as she had stopped growing. When she was born she was a skinny thing(6lb6oz) with almost no fleshyness. I bfed her and she was putting weight on at upto half a pound a week! When she reached 8-9lbs, dc1 and 2's birthweights, she tailed off a bit. No-one was bothered by her dramatic weight gain.
With my dd before her I had diabetes and was very large with fluid. She was born a very round looking 7lb15oz but lost 10% very quickly. I am assuming now as she weed out her excess fluid. Once she started to regain her birthweight she settled into a regular pattern of weight gain. Not after MW nagging me to 'top-up' her feeds

The diabetes obviously affected them and I also have a good blood pressure, not very low but never high. I wish more could be researched about weight loss/gain in the early days so mum's don't feel pressured to switch to formula when all they needed to do was have faith and carry on as they were doing