Do you avoid any foods while bfeeding? if so, which ones?

[pendulum]

Hi all,
I have a 6-week old DD2 who is finding it very difficult to settle/ sleep- she seems to have lots of lower intestinal gas and writhes around a lot trying to shift it. Various people (including my mother who has never bfed ) are giving me the usual advice about how I should cut x or y out of my diet- everything from chocolate to curry to green veg to milk to baked beans...... This happened with DD1 and I'm sure the sense of deprivation and that I was somehow 'poisoning' her led me to give up bfeeding quite early. I want to carry on as long as possible with DD2 who is a great feeder and piling on the weight, but don't want to live on chicken and boiled spuds for the next 6 months!

I would be really interested in others' experiences of whether mothers' diet makes a difference and, if so, which foods you think can be worth avoiding.

TIA

p

mommalove i know a few people whose dcs have silent reflux, so have planned to discuss it with gp at dd's 6 week check next week. bit of a bummer for you having to cut out dairy although obviously worth it if it works!

notquitegrownup- i am considering CO- had a very traumatic em cs and dd had to be yanked back up the birth canal with forceps. i need to get over my innate scepticism about alternative treatments but just keep hearing good things about CO. Do you know what the theory is behind it? (am genuinely interested, not challenging you )

phd- yes, dd is very clingy- to the extent that if i lie down next to her in bed, she will sleep so long as i am awake and touching her but wake up if i drop off [manic, wild-eyed emoticon] i can hear childcare experts shouting about rods and backs... did you 'train' (hate that word) yours out of it or did it just pass with age?

I avoided caffine and alcohol. Nothing else.

My BIL (know-it-all with no kids) told me off for having a curry, saying it would go to my milk and would make dd windy. My friend was there and, with an absolutely straight face, said "Oh gosh, yes you're right. And you should stop eating that poppadom right now or you'll make your milk crunchy!" Made me laugh.

My DD had colic for about the first 10-12 weeks or so, she just wanted to be on the breast all night and did seem to have quite bad wind. I think she just grew out of it though rather than anything I was eating, I did try cutting out a few things to see if there could be a trigger but couldn't identify a pattern.

I do remember being in tears one day though after DP came back from a boozy curry with a workmate (who has never met me or DD but had a wife who also bf a colicky baby), during which they had apparently worked it out that I was drinking too much lemonade and eating too much chocolate and that was causing the problem . Was fuming and managed to mutter through gritted teeth that the day that DP stopped smoking, drinking and eating curry I might consider cutting back on the terrible habit that is drinking lemonade and overindulging in Maltesers !!

Also pendulum your comments here sound just like me
"phd- yes, dd is very clingy- to the extent that if i lie down next to her in bed, she will sleep so long as i am awake and touching her but wake up if i drop off [manic, wild-eyed emoticon] i can hear childcare experts shouting about rods and backs... did you 'train' (hate that word) yours out of it or did it just pass with age?"

Honestly don't worry, DS2 would only sleep when next to me but he grew out of it fine.

without 'training'!

pendulum - hamg on in there!

For me it didn't matter what I avoided, he was still windy. Colief made a big difference but then I started feeding from one breast only for 4 hours or so before offering the other for the following 4hrs. Can't remember who suggested it to me and am dubious of the science behind it (suspect to do with oversupply and stuff? One for tiktok!) but for us it definitely helped cut the windiness.

Do try baby massage - even just bicycling their legs and then pushing knees towards the chest helps loads.

Well done!

Pendulum - sounds like you are doing great. Babycarrot had colic from 5 to 12 weeks with trapped wind & diarrhoea, and I wondered at the time if anything in my diet caused it, but decided not in the end. At 15 weeks, she has never slept on her own. The concept of "put down" for a nap is an alien one in the carrot household! Actually that's probably not very encouraging to you, is it? Sorry!

I eat everything, including copious quantities of cream cakes .

I figure if a nation of breastfeeding mothers in India exist happily on a diet of curries and spicy food, it's probably OK for us!

Just to add, re your LO sleeping with you ... my DS is 15wks and last night he momentously fell asleep unaided!

I nearly wept with relief! Not that I did anything to help him, just groaned and rolled him onto his side so his shrieks were quieter, then he went quiet and fell asleep

Have faith!

CSB - Hooray!!! Hearty congratulations and wish me luck for the same thing one day!

All the luck in the world carrot (but it's my recompense for still enduring furious howling every night ... )

thanks everyone

so my plan is: eat whatever i like

try baby massage

contact CO to discuss how they could help

try colief

try to sit it out for another 6 weeks without going bonkers

I feel scared becasue DD1 was similar with the screaming and refusing to sleep and i ended up with pnd. i was determined to enjoy my baby this time but can already feel the anger coming back when nothing i do helps and she is so miserable the whole time.

anyway must go to the gp for 6 week check, hope for his sake he is not too nice to me otherwise he might have a mad crying woman AND a screaming baby in his ofice

thanks for all the replies and support

xx

That sounds like a really good plan Pendulum. I too was very sceptical about CO, but was going out of my mind and would have tried all sorts of things. Seeing how content ds was, whilst they did the 'treatment', which basically involves very gently cradling his head in their hands, and talking soothingly, was very reassuring.

Plan b could be to try cutting down on dairy, if that is not too much of a pain for you. And I second the idea of asking about silent reflux, if just to rule it out. No experience of it myself, but I know I have read about it here lots of times, and it can present in a similar way to colic.

Best of luck. I too suffered pnd, as a result of those early months of colic with ds1 - but I didn't have MN to sound off to then. We do so know how you feel. Keep on posting.

pendulum-i'm having the same problem with my 5 wk old dd, colief is good, even though you do ahve to mess about a bit, i express a couple of ounces in the morning and use a couple of teaspoons before each feed to put the drops in, also, following on from what chubby said, what she described is called lactose overload i think, its when lo gets too much fore milk and it ferments in the bowel, causing wind and stomach ache, thats why you stick to using one breast in a set period. i don't know if its the colief or doing this which has helped in the last few days, but she seems happier, so i'm sticking to both for the time being! the only thing i've been avoiding is alcohol as she gets grumpy with that

I dont' avoid anything, except this week I have remembered the hard way that my dc don't like me to eat garlic while bfing. Ds1 used to get the most horrendous tummy pains if I did. Two days ago I had some garlic bread and ds3 (10wks) is only just getting over it. His colic has been massively worse. I won't be eating that again in a hurry.

Btw, he has osteopathy too which is beginning to help, and also he's just started a course of homeopathic massage arranged by the gp.

I just thought of something else...I had a birthing ball for when I was in labour, which I nearly had deflated after, but we have since found that holding babycarrot in arms and sitting and bouncing on it is nothing short of miraculous for when she is fussy or overtired. Especially if combined with the "tiger in a tree" position to relieve windy tummy. Daddies seem to be particularly good at this, I find...

I only had probs with curry and lager!

I had problems with coffee until DD was 6 months old. I rarely had it but when I did she just cried alot and wouldn't settle. I could drink champagne for the first two weeks then none until again about 6 months. I had been very sceptical about what you eat and BFing but there is something it in for some.

i ate and drank what i wanted. i didn't drink very much mainly because i was exhausted with a 2.5 year old and newborn.

I have stopped drinking cow's milk, as this makes my daughter wee uncontrollable for a day after, she also get runny poo and a red anus.

Yogurt, icecream also trigger her reaction, another positive reason for us to stick to breastfeeding, as she would properly react to that too.

Message withdrawn

I didn't avoid anything
Eventually mine learnt to burp and that solved the wind issue