Six-week-old constantly crying despite reflux treatment and milk allergy formula

[LeoSun11]

My 6 week old daughter is constantly fussing. Wow… people told me 2 under 2 would be difficult but I never anticipated it to be this hard.

from week 2 of my daughters arrival it has been hell on wheels to put it lightly. She has cried non stop. We’ve been admitted to hospital due to lack of feeding, fearful she was dehydrated. We are on nutramigen 1 for a suspected milk allergy & gaviscon for reflux but I can confidently say I think it made a difference for about 5 days… we’re now back to the constant crying. She’s inconsolable constantly. It’s so difficult to keep my house calm and quiet as my son is only 23 months. I don’t know what to do anymore. We wind her between feeds for at least 20 mins. Keep her upright. Minimise sound when she’s tired. I feel like everything we do is wrong & to be quite honest I feel like a failure this time around.

I finally felt like I cracked it with my son & was actually enjoying motherhood but I’m so upset. As a mum all you want to do is make your baby happy and feel safe… I feel like she’s the opposite. I know they go through a leap at this age but I can’t ever recall my son being this trivial at any stage? Any advice welcome

Sorry you're having a hard time! Have you tried carrying in a sling? One of mine had reflux and needed to be upright so this helped in that I didn't just have to sit there holding her. 6 weeks is tiny, hang in there!

You are not a failure! Having a second child is hard! The crying peaks at around this time. It’s really like someone just turns the volume up.

Like someone else has mentored, a sling is a Godsend. I also find a baby cherry stone heated belt is a life saver. I’m sure you have already tried it but get the baby moving with some “baby yoga” to relieve gas.

Talk to the health visitor and if needed take a trip back to the GP for help. Don’t feel like a nuisance, sometimes you have to be a bit pushy to get referrals in the NHs.

If you can, please give yourself a break. Do you have anyone who can have the baby while you recharge?

My third had colic and the experience was completely different to my other babies, you have my sympathies. Things that helped - having a bath together, going to baby swimming classes so she had the water completely around her, using a fabric stretchy sling, holding her along your arm belly down so your arm pressed gently in to her, pacing the living room holding her for hours. At 12 weeks it eased a lot.

https://www.babydoc.com.au/faq/colic-bore-your-baby-to-sleep/

Does this help at all? What about a dummy? Sorry it’s tough for you.

thank you all for your kind words - she is very difficult to settle we usually have to pace about with her before she’ll fall asleep but still takes crying spells. I’ve tried her in a carrier/sling and she just kicks off :( I’m so exhausted. My mother in law has been helping kindly however it’s more so in the evening it peaks… hoping it passes when she gets a bit bigger. I never experienced this with my first so it’s been very difficult to resolve!

It is probably still the reflux and milk allergy as you are on the first line of treatment for both and whilst it is enough for some babies not all respond.

From a reflux point of view you start by thickening the feeds to see if that makes it harder to reflux. They can also prescribe omperazole which reduces the acidity of the stomach contents and eases the discomfort from refluxing the stomach contents. There are also other medications that can be prescribed through paediatrics which help in different ways. My daughter needed gaviscon, omperazole at the highest doses and domperidone which speeds up the emptying of the stomach to manage her reflux.

The allergy formulas start with "extensively hydrolysed" formulas. These are dairy based but they have been treated which breaks down the proteins. Imagine taking a pair of scissors to a news article. For some babies this will be enough for them to not be able to recognise what the article is about but others they can. There are two dairy proteins and you can be allergic to one and not the other or both and most of the hydrolysed formulas only have one of the proteins broken up. They usually recommend you try two hydrolysed formulas before moving on to the next line of treatment which is elemental or amino acids formulas. These contain the building blocks of dairy without being from dairy. To keep the newspaper analogy going this is like printing each word separately which makes it impossible to know what the story was about.

Sending hugs. We’ve been going through it a little too, ours is 8 weeks with reflux and we have a 2 yo. So exhausting but it’s slowly getting better - have heart - in six weeks things will be so much better. Our oldest went on Omeprozole and it helped. We’ve been taking it in shifts to keep an eye on our 8 week old while sleeping him on his side. That’s meant we can get him back in the cot which is just far less exhausting than holding him up for hours on end. So
sorry you’re going through this xx

Pretty sure Nutramigen still has dairy in it and although hydrolyzed some babies don't tolerate that either. They make you try formulas with a bit of dairy in it before they let you try Neocate.

My baby had CMPA and the crying was horrific. I'm still traumatised to be honest. It stopped once we got the allergy under control.

Things have thankfully improved, she still has the odd spell of crying but nothing compared to what it was before. We’ve found feeding her upright and keeping her upright for a good half an hour 45 mins after a feed has significantly helped. I’ve actually been feeding her walking about so she’s being held up whilst feeding too.

she’s still only managing 2-3oz per feed however… unsure if that’s normal or what. My son was on 5oz at this age

It sounds like there is still reflux going on at the moment. It might be worth another review with the GP. It could be the dairy in the formula that still triggering the reflux bit not as bad as the regular formula or it could be that the dairy free formulas are thinner and you might need more reflux treatment alongside it

Sorry to hear you're going through this,it sounds very like my DGD (now 19) who was diagnosed with lactose intolerance and reflux at 6 weeks. It felt as she never stopped crying during the first 3 months of her life. We found that keeping her upright for at least half an hour after a feed helped with the reflux. It does get easier,once she was about 6 or 7 months old and sitting up more it definitely improved. Also,once she started on solid food she improved. Good luck,it does get better!