4 week old has trapped wind and I feel like I've tried everything to get it up!

[Sammie101]

Hi all, my DD is 4 weeks and suffers from really bad trapped wind. She arches her back, pulls her feet up to her chest, cries and just seems like she's in so much pain! This has been going on since she was about 2 weeks. We started using infacol religiously at 2 weeks and it seemed to help a little but now it doesn't help at all!

I have tried gripewater twice after her feeds and tried every position possible when burping her and I got nothing :( She eventually just falls asleep after crying and crying so much that the only thing that settles her is going back on my breast (which isn't helping when I then have to try and wind her AGAIN and risk upsetting her)

I've tried sitting her upright on my knee and patting/rubbing/massaging. Lying her across my knees. Straight up with her head against my shoulder. Sitting her up and rotating her body in circular motions and then backwards and forwards. Literally every suggestion people have given online I have tried :(

Am I missing some miracle cure or product that I should be using? She is breastfed and I have overactive letdown, she barely has to suck and milk is right there (even positioning my breast causes me to squirt a lot of milk at her--ooops!) However DD is also very impatient and sucks as if she'll never be fed again which doesn't make the wind any easier.

Sorry for the long post, I have a tendancy to blather on! x

You poor thing. DD suffered terribly with wind it was a nightmare. The only thing that made any difference for us was to gently push each knee in turn to the opposing shoulder for 15-20 seconds and she would generally let rip with some big farts! Apologies if you have already tried this though.

Some people swear by colief but I think you'd have to express a bit of breastmilk to add it to so a bit of a faff but maybe worth asking the HV/GP about if you're desperate? This kellymom page might also help with ideas for dealing with your letdown.

If this is all useless you can just rant. It is hard but things do get better

What position are you feeding her in? Have you tried keeping her upright?

Are you also sure it's not reflux? Is her cry hoarse? It sounds a bit like a silent reflux cry to me, which would also fit with her finding the milk soothing. Dd has severe reflux and has always struggled with burping, I have to keep her upright for around 20-30 mins after feeds to stand a chance of them emerging before putting her down. Sympathies. It's rotten!

other winding positions that might be worth trying are lying her facing down on your forearm, with her head in you hand, and sort of swing/rocking her whilst rubbing her back. Also cycling her legs whilst she's lying on her back to get wind out the other end!
If you've got a massive let down/oversupply, then starting a feed, unlatching when the let down happens, and letting the milk run into a muslin for 30secs can help.
We ended up using colief which did help, but is a real faff when you're bfing.

DD was horrendous for both silent reflux and wind. Our HV recommended sitting her on my knee facing sideways (ie both her legs over one of my thighs) then tipping her backwards to almost flat then bringing her back up to sitting. Not quickly, about two seconds in each direction.

Does she settle back on the breast until you take her off to wind her again?

Is it possible she just wants to cluster feed - swapping back and forth between breasts for an extended period?

Ids there a baby massage class near you? I learned a trick for DS2 who had permanent, really sharp wind pains, and it was wonderful.

You 'walk' your fingers down their tummy from top to bottom, left to right. You actually find the wind bubble - it's hard - and then you walk it with your fingers out of the body. Very weird feeling but it works. Hard to explain, though. Worth getting a trained baby massage person to teach it to you.

Thanks for the replies :)

I just gave her a 3oz bottle of expressed milk with a little bit of gripe water in and she did two huge pumps/poos and two little burps.

I tried the suggestions of bringing her knees up to her opposite elbow and the laying her down and then sitting her up and didn't get anything, not sure if it's because she did the pumps and burps?

My sister did suggest the position of having her in my arms slanting downwards but I'm not confident doing it so I'll ask her to show me when I next see her-I would probably drop the poor thing!

I know it's a bit rubbish with the colief having to be mixed in with a bottle, I normally have one bottle of breast milk expressed just incase she needs feeding when we're out and about (I'm still too nervous to breastfeed in public :() so expressing every feed would be horrible, especially for the night feeds!

I thought maybe at first it might be silent reflux because she doesn't really puke up at all, just on the odd occasion, but when I last saw my HV she said it was just colic :-/ Even if it is "just colic", it's still awful to have her crying in pain with me feeling helpless! But it's also annoying when after her feed I try to burp her and after a minute or 2 she wriggles and cries and arches her back making it near impossible to try and burp her! As for the cluster feeding, I'm really not sure, she seems to feed quite regularly. She has a feed, is awake for about 2 hours during the day, has a 2 hour nap and then wakes for her next feed. The past few days though when I've barely been able to get any burps and she hasn't pooed a lot she constantly wakes up from her nap with her tummy making grumbly noses! So I end up with a grouchy baby who hasn't had her full daytime naps!

Sorry again for the long post--I really do just like to rant! x

Babies often need to feed more frequently in the evenings. When she wriggles and cries after a feed have you tried putting her back to the breast?

Also forgot to mention-I've heard a few people suggest having 20-30 minutes tummy time? Is this just putting her on her playmat on her tummy or across my lap? When I put her on her mat she just started to scream!

And we normally feed in the rugby ball position, so she's quite upright if I can angle the visions correctly! The thought of keeping her upright 20-30 minutes after a feed fills me with dread when it comes to night feeds, but I suppose it has to be done! Sometimes it can take up to 2 hours to feed and settle her (most of this time is settling) because we can't put her down until she is absolutely asleep or else she whinges and then screams to be picked up!

@hetienne yeah normally she comes off maybe 2 or 3 times and I always offer her the same breast to make sure she's getting the fatty milk at the end of her feed. After that I usually see if she wants the other breast but most of the time she's not interested

Don't take the word of a HV, she can't tell it's not reflux just by looking! Talk to a GP. It sounds very much like reflux.

Both of ours were refluxers, DS very severe, and the one thing we never really had to do was keep them upright after feeds at night. The cot was always elevated at the top end so they slept on a 30 degree slope, and that kept them comfy enough. Night feeds were bad enough without having to wait around afterwards!

@crazyoldcatlady I know, my HV kind of scares me, and I feel like my doctor would think I was wasting his time! Which is so silly really because my baby comes first! Do babies with reflux cry a lot? DD isn't constantly crying, just the past few days she has been moaning and grunting A LOT in her sleep and she really seems to hate being burped!

To top it off OH has gone to the pub after being at work today! He saw her for about half an hour when she was asleep and I'm the one that's been dealing with a little squawker who no longer likes her naps and now I don't have anyone to talk to in the evening when I normally would! Cranky girlfriend alert

You don't have to express the whole feed to use coilef, I used to mix the coilef with a little bm, a syringe full, start the feed, stop after a minute, squirt in the colief/bm mixture, then finish the feed.

DS was the same. The HV lent me a tummy tub which was great so I ended up buying one. I also took him to a cranial osteopath, after three sessions I had a different baby! He was happy and didn't cry non stop!

Sounds very like silent reflux experienced here too-I second elevating the cot but for dd that wasn't enough, but does help. I found a wedge on Amazon for around £11 which helped. If your GP makes you feel bad, change GP! You know your baby. You know how upset your baby is. And I don't wear 'it's only distress'-until you've LIVED colic/reflux it's hard to imagine how hard it is.

The other thing that helped dd was a motorised swing. She napped in that a fair bit. Motion still soothes her at 9 mths.

Yes, tummy time is just hanging out in their stomachs. Ds HATED it but as he'd only sleep on us he actually got plenty of it! Both mine had good head control (relative to age obviously) but that's just genetic.

I also had a tummy tub which both of mine have loved. Recommend getting a stand as well, ours was an eBay bargain and still in use as a bathroom stool for hand washing etc.

Before going down any road which assumes something is 'wrong', and I include wind or reflux or tong tie in all of that, please do call a bf helpline and ask to discuss over supply....you're ticking many of the boxes and it is often easy to fix :)