3 week old constipation

[HopelesslyHopeful87]

Looking for some advice regarding my 3 week old dd and constipation - or at least what I'm assuming to be constipation.

She is formula fed on aptamil and feeds well taking about 4oz every 3 hours. Plenty of wet nappies and gained weight really well since birth.

I think she is constipated and I'm wondering if perhaps she isn't and if what we're experiencing may actually be a realm of normal or if I need to seek advice.

She tends to open her bowels only once a day sometimes every other day. Stools are yellow and normal looking. She seems to have tummy ache almost every afternoon. She cries a lot, draws and kicks her legs and I can often feel her bottom straining but nothing coming out.

I have tried bicycling her legs, massaging her tummy clockwise, warm baths, and cooled boiled water on the advice of the HV. She refused to drink it after multiple offerings. Once she passes a stool she seems to be so much more relaxed, will sleep better and generally is more settled.

I am now contemplating trying the comfort and constipation milk but wanted to seek advice here first. Will this pass with no action from me other that what I'm doing? Should I go to the GP? Or is this indeed just normal?

I'm finding myself getting a bit anxious about this now and constantly trying to get her to poo or worrying that she hasn't pooed etc.

They do put in a lot of effort at that age but the consistency sounds ok and the frequency sounds ok too. Doesn't sound like constipation

As PP said, if the poo isn't hard, then it's not a condition that needs treating. Some babies just put a lot of effort into pooing!

Thanks for quick replies. Is once a day or less okay though? My previous babies have opened their bowels multiple times a day. I know you shouldn't compare but you can't help it sometimes can you?

It doesn’t sound much like constipation, but I did this with my DD (8 week old now). Health visitor advised changing her formula to colic and constipation milk around 2 weeks old after not pooping for 5 days and she was in a lot of pain. Tried a splash of fresh orange and cooled boiled water, massages, baths etc nothing worked apart from the comfort milk. I tried to change her back recently to normal formula but she was the same again in a lot of pain. The comfort milk worked within an hour.

Does sound normal, I remember worrying about similar with DS. He seemed to struggle on the powdered formula, and on the advice of our HV we used the premade formula every other bottle and that seemed to help

As odd as it sounds babies need to learn to poo and it is a tricky thing for them to learn.

After six weeks you can do baby anti colic massage which can help too.

I have exactly the same with my DD she will poop every other day normally and will spend a morning fussing before she can go. I found if I put colief in one bottle a day this tends to help her go, I think even if not constipation if you make sure you are regularly massaging, hot baths all the things your doing up are pro-active and then will not turn into constipation. Does happen a lot with formula fed babies but changing milk is quite drastic for babies when they are used to one milk and I don't think you need to worry quite yet. Good luck x

My DS was the same. I'd switch to the ready made formula for a day every few days and he'd poo easily then switch back to formula.

What makes the ready made any different to what we make at home though?

Hv has advised the comfort milk which I started this morning. She said to give it three days to see if I see improvement and if not to change brands but I don't feel comfortable with that many changes in such a short period of time.

Baby has pood today but with anal stimulation from me (like a puppy!) also advised by the HV.

She said that passing a stool once a day or every other day is within the realm of normal but the pain in between is not normal hence her advice.

Not sure, I guess it must have something slightly different in it, but we stuck to the same brand.
In the end although we started off on Aptamil, we switched to Hipp Organic. We also tried Hipp Organic Comfort milk. Those nappies were... rather unpleasant.

It might be because it is heat treated so makes it slightly more broken down

My DD suffered terribly with constipation - she was in so much pain and literally screamed when she pooed as they were so hard for her to pass. Eventually on the recommendation of a friend we changed to Hipp and she improved within a day - I just wished we had done it sooner!