Problems with feeding at four months

[Hyena]

My DS is 17 weeks tomorrow. He's been exclusively BF up to now and in an ideal world I'd love to continue but feeding is really getting me down at the moment.

We're had problems with feeding from day 1 - latch problems, green poo, sore tummy etc.

Last week we had a few days where he fed non stop (growth spurt?) but for the last two days he has cried every time I've put him to the breast. He arches his back, pulls away and acts as though I'm trying to poison him. When I get him latched on he's very easily distracted and pulls really hard on my nipple when he hears a noise/spots something out of the corner of his eye, and this makes feeding in public impossible.

We've always had explosive poos - green up until recently but now yellow and up to his shoulders. This happens up to four times a day. He's always pulling his knees up to his tummy and grunting and has some sort of eczema ....allergies has been suggested but would these present in this way?

Both of my DS's have had very similar symptoms as described by the OP,
I used to deal with very screamy feed, and hideous nappies which would explode up to their neck,

neither has had an allergy,
both have had a silent reflux,

it sorted itself out within 24hrs of being weaned,
and I weaned at approx 19/20 weeks on doctors advice because of the reflux

Thanks Iggly.

That's good to hear IWillNot - I'm petrified of things getting worse when weaning begins. I still haven't tried formula in fear of a reaction.

IWillNot my DS also has silent reflux. He's on ranitidine which is great but was still windy/green poos hence me going no dairy. We start weaning in 3 weeks time so I'll speak to the doc about stopping the medication to see if weaning helps!

I dont know why I didnt think of silent reflux either. I have a few friends whose babies suffered quite badly (one was the friend who I mentioned had to cut diary out of her diet)

If you do a search in "mumsnet talk" there are hundreds of threads on the subject! Like this one

My friends found it hard to get a diagnose though (twas mainly thanks to very good HV) as it seems to be the "in" thing at the mo so the GP's around here are not very symphathetic.

DS2 had a tummy bug and it upset his little system for a quite a bit afterwards -longer than he had the tummy bug for!(he had a few reflux symptoms), but GP said I just had to wait for it to work out his body. However the lovely HV that I mentioned said to buy some infant gaviscon over the counter & it worked like a dream in just a day or so!

All except one of my friends babies "outgrew" the reflux once weaned, and the other baby has been diagnosed with a specific heriditry medical condition.

If you go along the reflux route, make sure you get a dietitian referral too.

No worries Hyena,

Before she was diagnosed, I spoke to my HV and my GP about this and they weren't worried at all as she was putting on weight. Thing is, the HV just said go to your Gp and the Gp is not a paediatrician so said, "yes it sounds like reflux but she's putting on weight so that's the important thing...". Ie not much sympathy, in spite of the fact that he is lovely. TBh I just don't think he knew that much about it but did prescribe me rantiadine (I had been putting baby gaviscon in her bottles but that hadn't worked), which didn't work. So I eventually took her to a private paed who took one look at her and put her on neocate, and then omeprazole, and now domperidone as well. Poor thing. But it has helped so much.

Anyway sorry to waffle - hope you are getting on okay - just wanted to say really that if going to GP you may well have to push quite hard.

I am also going to start weaning her at 17 1/2 weeks which is the earliest they now recommend - my friend is a paediatric dietician and she says that is safe, and lots of reflux babies are weaned early. Apparently new research has shown that before 17 1/2 weeks can cause allergies as the baby's gut is too immature to cope but that after then is fine. Will just do baby rice, then move on to a bit of veg puree and possiblly some fruit although obv fruit acids can aggravate the acidy reflux baby.

Good luck!

Sorry for not coming back to this thread sooner. It's been a busy week. DD has had a UTI and DS has been waking more than usual at night.

Kingsroadie - Thanks for the post. DS is about 17.5 weeks now but I'm hoping to hang him out a little longer - he is waking frequently at night but he still doesn't seem anywhere near ready for food. I haven't spoken to the HV or GP for fear or being ignored. We're thinking of paying privately for an allergy test but I'm not sure whether to go to Bupa or somewhere alternative.
YoMoJo - I'm seeing the HV on Weds for the third lot of jabs so I'll speak to her about silent reflux then. It's great to hear the the Gaviscon worked so quickly. I'll have a search now. Thanks.

I've looked into silent reflux and it does sound like he is suffering from it but now the green poo had returned and we're having upto ten explosive nappies a day. He's quite a happy little lad though other than scratching his skin.

Hi there

Not sure if this message comes too late, was looking for threads on weaning my 6 month old and came across this!

I have a DS who is 3 yrs and a DD who is 6 months old. Both of them had silent reflux and some of the symptoms you describe are classic sr - arching back, distracted, unhappy feeding, explosive poos. Silent reflux can be helped with medicines such as ranitidine and gaviscon and once it's under some sort of control the baby becomes a much more happy, relaxed feeder. As for the pulling back and nipple clamping - my DD did this and it caused me so much pain that I ended up resorting to bottles! Could be high milk supply - babies sometimes clamp down to stop a very gushing let down. I tried 'block feeding' (feeding twice from one side, then twice from the other for a week) to reduce the supply but it didn't really work and I ended up getting mastitis!

Do hope things are a bit easier a month on but if you happen to read this and want any more info on sr let me know...

xx