Feeding problems 10 week old.

[oxouk]

Hi all,

Have feeding issues with our new born son, 10 weeks old, just refusing to take milk at all. Almost always takes half and he's just not interested in the other half.

We're always taking about half or just over half of the nhs recommendation for his weight which is roughly 25 Oz per day.

At first we thought it was because the milk went cold so we started warming up the bottle between winding but that worked for a bit but now he's lost interest again.

We've tried all of the different milks but nothing seems to be working. Any suggestions would be welcome. He's sometimes producing clay like stalls which we thought was the problem, constipation but even when stalls are normal he's still refusing milk.

I'm also interested to know if your new norms hit ever hit the recommended amounts? Appreciate they're guides but would be good to know.

Following! Was just about to post the same thing myself.

My little boy is 13 weeks and this has been going on for three weeks. Getting progressively worse. Now at the point of almost complete bottle refusal.

Someone help!

How often are you offering the bottle? Have you tried feeding small amounts more often? My LO fed 10 times a day at that age so feeds were smaller than the guidance on the pack but added up over the day.

We did try little and often but do you just stop on the times he wants more to keep it to little and often?

I was just guided by her. So I let her have what she wanted at each feed, so some feeds would be a couple of oz and then other more. She now feeds 6 times a day- bigger ones in the morning every 3-4 hours by evening smaller feeds but tend to be 2 hourly. (She is 4 months now)
At 11 weeks a typical day looked like this feed wise:
Wake at 5.30- 4oz
8.30- 4oz
11- 4oz
14- 3oz
16- 3oz
18 - 2oz
19.30- 1oz
The would have 2-3oz as one night feed. Total 24-25oz which was how much she should have.
She is on Hipp and always seems to have slightly less than they say. She is following her curve as well now.

Also a friend of mine had a similar problem- they were using a perfect prep machine but when they used a kettle and cooled it baby would take the feed. Very odd indeed. They checked the prep machine and changed the filter- no problems with the machine but now just have to do it with a kettle.

How are you getting on @oxouk ?

Hey,

Been round the houses a bit to say the least.

Doctors thought it was silent reflux and prescribed omeprazole. It's stronger than baby Gaviscon. We tried this with normal sma for a week and he was doing ok but was drinking a low amount, we got desperate and Paid for a private nurse to look at him. She thought he had tongue tie, we got a second opinion and indeed he did have 80% tongue tie.

We had that done, and we did see an improvement for a few weeks but his stools were very runny, not sure why this was but could be the calpol...

He progressively got worse, arching his back, straining, still having runny poo.

we then were told he might have a milk allergy, so we went into a special milk called nutramlgen, and again he was doing ok, but feeding was a pain, he was doing ok for 2 weeks, was averaging about 20 Oz a day, his poo improved but then.... 2 weeks in, we're not seeing a massive improvement on his feeding.

We got a bit creative and added some vanilla essence around the teat of the bottle and he was absolutely smashing bottles.... we couldn't believe it, but obviously we're not sure if that's a clever thing to do but proved to us that it was the taste he didn't like.

Doctor then gave us another specialist milk from aptimil called pepti 1, it has more lactose in it which might taste better / slightly sweeter.

No joy with that.

So.... options are getting less and less and it's even more difficult now because of covid19, not as easy to explore other options with doctors etc.

So we decided to forget the milk allergy suggestion and go onto HIPP organic with silent reflux medication (omeprazole) and have that another go (Wednesday of this week) and he's destroying bottles. Today he's done 18 Oz and it's barely lunchtime, so it's looking promising, but we have so many ups and downs that I'm not going to say we've cured him until we've had a few weeks of good feeds.

We're still in the thick of it too @oxouk. We're already on Hipp Organic but he's very sickly after feeds now. They still take an hour and we get 2-4oz down him. His poos are a mixture of yellow and green. No sign of CMPA. Had been on gavisgon and omprezole when he was younger but stopped them as I thought it was causing a bottle aversion.

Now I don't know what to do. Have some Aptamil ready made in the cupboard which I'm tempted to try at next feed (we changed to Hipp at 8 weeks because of bad trapped wind), just to see if he'll drink more.

Have you found with changing to Hipp he drank more straight away?? Or took a few bottles?

How did you administer the reflux meds?

What is he/she taking over 24 hours? Bad day for us is 17/18 and good day was 25

We've found that he has taking the milk straight away, but if you smell the specialist milks you'll understand! He's probably relieved.

I feel for you, we're in the same boat, we need to see a long stretch of time before we will say if we've conquered it or not

It is frustrating, I think doctors are quick to Say it's a milk allergy / reflux just to move you on.

But 9/10 it's about working it out yourself, which is hard work when you need to commit to a change for 7-10 days.

Me and my partner were close to tears each feeding. especially when the others baby's who are younger and already weigh more.

Also what bottle and test size?

Teat*

@oxouk we're MAM bottles and size 2 teats.
I gather the sick is reflux related but he doesn't seem in pain anymore hence why I haven't thought of restarting the omprezole (we administered via syringe)
I'm feeling a little anxious as he hasn't been weighed in a month due to covid, and the HV was seeing him once a fortnight, although his weight has never been a massive concern

How old?

And how much is he being fed / taking over 24 hours?

We too are on mam, but we do switch between size 2-3 teats

He's 4.5 months/20 weeks. Been going on since he was 10 weeks. He takes between 20-25oz a day on average. Sometimes less, rarely more, although with the sleep regression he tends to have another 2oz feed at 1am

Sounds very similar to our situation, how long did you try the reflux meds for?

@oxouk not that long to be fair, as people made out the results would be instantaneous

This is our second time on it, it's worth a shot right.

If he's spitting up milk / sicking up milk, it does sound like reflux or silent reflux.

Have you looked under his tongue? Does his tongue move about quite well? And can his tongue go past his bottom lip?

Tongue tie is also worth looking at, doctors and nurses at birth do not usually raise it as an issue which is quite alarming really.

@oxouk he had posterior tongue tie snipped twice within the first two weeks so don't think it's that now, although there is a possibility it could have resealed.
Just tried the ready made Aptamil. Behaved the same and took 4oz but no sick with the burps 🤷🏻‍♀️

No sick is a good sign, I'm starting to think that each baby has a milk preference that you have to find. Have you tried SMA?

When he's sick, how much we talking? Projectile? Or just a few ml / maybe an Oz?

@oxouk probably about 20mls once or twice a feed so not a massive massive amount. Interestingly when we were on gavisgon and omprezole it was for silent reflux as he was never actually sick. This seems to be something that's started over the past couple of months?
Not tried SMA or Cow and Gate. Not sure whether it's worth picking up some ready made cartons to try or I should just stick to Hipp?

Worth trying although the ready made stuff does have a different texture to powder, so isn't always the best test.

What did you decide?