Help - Bottle / NG tube fed 11 week old baby not hungry anymore!

[Tilly8888]

My baby is now 11 weeks old, has had an NG tube from birth (due to renal disease) and is also being bottle fed but is now refusing point blank to have any milk from the bottle which means we have to use the NG tube for all feeds. He is finishing a cold and has been vomiting again even though he is on Gaviscon Infant sachets but I've been told it would return to normal as he is less bunged up, which has not happened yet. He is retching after feeds now and is vomiting on and off. Any ideas?

HI Tilly, poor you, you must be having a stressful time. I'm not sure I can help much but I'll try. If your LO is under the weather with a cold it might just be that he/she isn't very hungry at the moment. Obviously when you have a NG tube your little one has no control over how much milk they are having. So, unlike BFeeders they have no choice over how much they drink but also you know how much they are having and worry if it's less that normal. My DS had a NG tube for five weeks in hospital and has always been bottle fed since as he was prem with silent reflux, so feeding him was very difficult. My point is, I used to stress myself silly about how much milk he would take but now I realise that some days he was just hungrier than others. Of course if he hasn't fed well for a couple of days or more I would talk to the doctor, but don't worry if he doesn't fancy the odd feed, especially if ill.

Is the vomiting common? Are you on infant Gavisgon for reflux? I didn't find it helped at all and if that's the case I would try to get referred to a dietician. There is a very good support thread for reflux on MN.

If you LO is gaining weight then that's the main thing. I hope that helps a bit. I obviously don't understand your particular situation but I can appreciate how stressful it is.

Good luck.

His cold is pretty much gone now but he's still refusing the bottle after a few ml. Very frustrating as we do not have the luxury to leave him be as he must have a specific amount every 4 hrs due to his renal condition. He is on Gaviscon Infant and his vomiting has slowed down now. We will be trying to bottle feed him only in a couple of weeks for a trial period of 48 hrs so I was hoping we would have a good head start but it doesn't look that way. Thanks anyway!