Should I give formula to a formula-fed baby (11 months) with diarrhoea, or just water?

[MuffinMclay]

This duplicates a thread in 'health' but I haven't had any replies there.

Ds woke up this morning with diarrhoea. I think milk makes diarrhoea worse (but please correct me if I'm wrong), so gave him water instead of formula for breakfast, and he's drunk more on and off all morning.

He only has milk first and last thing, but I'm wondering if I should give him milk this evening or not? If so, should it be mixed with water rather than full stregth? If not, when do I reintroduce it?

This is my first experience of diarrhoea with ds and I don't really have a clue what I should or shouldn't be doing.

when dd got d&v the doc suggested i water down her formula to about half-strength and that seemed to help her keep it down. she had some plain finger food as well, just pasta and peas, that sort of thing. the diarrhea just worked its course over a few days.

The doctor told me when ds had it that the old fashioned approach was no milk but nowadays they recommend giving small amounts of milk more often than usual. We did 3oz bottles every two hours. We just gave dry toast or biscuits until he was better and didn't go anywhere near fruit until his poos were back to normal.

That's v young for water, but my instinct would be to try cooled, boiled water for a couple of hours. Dairy is dreadful for stomach upsets. Have you tried NHS direct?

I'll try NHS Direct amd see what they say. Never been able to get through to them in the past.

He's not vomiting at all, if that makes a difference to anything. He ate a small amount of dry toast for lunch.

Thanks for the advice.

An update (I hate not knowing how things on MN turn out, even really dull questions like this one).

I just spoke to NHS Direct (called me back within 3 minutes ). They advised that I should give him small amounts of formula at frequent intervals, not watered down, with meals as near to normal as possible but without any dairy products or fruit or veg (so not normal at all IMO). He only seems to want to eat breadsticks anyway.

Hope all went well. Must admit I read your post wrong and thought your little one was 11 weeks .. ummm... oops!