Help - baby gries when poos!!

[fee77]

Please help me, as i am sure you all hate to see your ds / dd crying in pain. My 5wk old bottle fed dd has started crying when she poos. Her poo is fairly solid and she has done 5 "bits" in the past 24 hours. She is on gripe water to help with her wind problem - could this be causing it? Everything i read says babies under 3mths rarely get constipation - i make sure her feeds are measured carefully, and have tried giving her bottled water. Help - i've started crying with her!

I don't think that hard, painful stools are that uncommon in formula fed babies of whatever age. The reason being that formula is made from cows milk usually and it has a different casein content to human milk, which makes it slightly more diffcult for a newborn to digest and does tend to produce firmer, smellier stools than breastmilk.

I'd keep doing what you are doing and offer her water, but I would tend to make sure it is cooled boiled water rather than just bottled water. If you are really worried then speak to your Health Visitor, GP or Practice Nurse.

I found that my DS had dreadful trapped wind when I switched to furmula. He used to scream and then pass wind lots. I was recommended to use Dr Brown's bottles. They are specially designed to stop as much air getting in as your baby feeds. I've since stopped using Infacol or Gripe Water.

They're a little more expensive than other bottles, about £5 each, but considering I used to spend a fortune on Infacol, they've easily paid their way. They also take longer to clean, but it's all worth it to see the little boy happy!!

Why not try just a couple and see how you go....

BR

Don't give your dd bottled water because it may have to much mineral and salts in it. Are you making up her formula with bottled as well? You should always use boiled tap water for formula and for drinks, unless your 'local' tap water isn't suitable for any reason, in which case your HV should be able to tell you which bottled waters are suitable. I think Volvic is OK, but it should still be boiled. Have you tried a different formula? The iron contetn can make some babies constipated, and changing to a different form can help.

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Fee77 - maybe she has a milk/dairy intolerance. A friend of mine's dd2 had terrible constipation probs which only improved when she was switched to Soya milk... just a thought

My ds did this when he started having breast milk plus formula
also screamed the place down after feeds
tried him on soya formula and he was fine (although some HVs and docs have a problem with soya as it has a high balance of sugars apparently)
gradually got ds onto normal formaula at about 4-5 months
try 1 part fruit juice to 4 parts water
or speak to health vistor

We had this. DS cried when farting at this age, and was in discomfort when pooing, but not as bad as wind. We also found rubbing his tummy in a clockwise motion helped.

Medical advice was that this was quite normal, and that we should try a little extra water in his feeds as well as the tummy rubbing, and that if it got worse or continued we should swap to a different milk.

One time when I rang NHS Direct I explained the problem and the nurse instantly said "you use SMA Gold, don't you?"

He got over it fairly quickly, and we never did swap milk.