Breastfed baby weights

[baby7th]

Hello 👋

My baby is 11 days old, at birth I was told she was one weight (7.15) but then on the first weigh in at home by midwife she was 600g above birth weight so midwife said it’s impossible to have gained all that 😅 so said that the weight has been wrote down wrong from birth so I looked at my picture of her on the weighing scales at birth and shown the midwife. Turns out she was actually 8.11.
Anyway now it appears she lost 160g on first weigh in, then yesterday in second way in she lost 40g and not put any on. I’m so worried. She’s breastfeeding well, has several wet and dirty nappies a day. Is it normal for them to lose weight in two weigh ins after birth even though they are breastfeeding well? She’s coming back to weigh on Thursday but just concerned 😟

It is normal for babies to lose weight in the first few days, then start to gain and be back to birth weight around day 10.

I am confused by the different weight formats you have used. If you post the weights in grams, rather than lbs and oz I can work out the percentages for you?

Yes, it's normal that they will lose a bit of weight at first. As long as it doesn't go over 10% of birth weight it's considered OK, they should start to regain though and not keep dropping.

8lbs 11oz is 3940 grams.

Sorry for the confusion

It says on her stickers her birth weight was 3160g

First weigh in on day 5 she weighed 3800g

So midwife said birth weight has been written incorrectly because it's impossible to have put all that weight on in 5 days

So I show her a photo of baby actually on weighing scales at birth and weighing scales shows 3960 so she had actually lost weight instead

Then yesterday ok day 10 she was weighed again and weighed 3760g so lost more weight and this is what I'm worried about.

Okay, so her initial weight loss was 4%, which is well within the normal range of up to 8%. With the further weight loss, it is now 5%. Still within the normal range, however the expectation is that the weight starts to go up.

40g is fairly minimal, and I would not be overly concerned. I would be advising regular feeding, no longer than 3 hours apart - counting from the beginning of previous feed, more often if baby asks. Are you leaving her on the breast until she comes off on her own? Also offering both breasts at every feed?

Are you finding feeding comfortable? Has anyone checked your latch?

Well at least the weight loss has slowed down! 160g from day 0-5 and then 40g from day 5-10. So in fact she might have lost a bit more and then started to regain. But this is only 5% in total so not a huge concern. And plenty of wet and dirty nappies is a good sign.

But it might be worth having a feed observed. Can you phone and ask if they will refer you to the infant feeding specialist?

Or other resources that might be accessible in your area:

NCT
La Leche League
Association of Breastfeeding mothers
National Breastfeeding helpline
Baby Café

The above services are free (you might have to pay normal phone call costs for some of the helplines)

Or you could search for a local IBCLC. A lot offer remote sessions, unfortunately it's a private healthcare service so you do have to pay for this.
lcgb.org/find-an-ibclc/

It took all three of mine up to three weeks to regain birth weight. They were slow gainers for the first month or so and then after that the weight piled on!

Up to 10% is normal. Sounds like you don’t have anything to worry about just yet. Keep offering her the breast, don’t let her go 3 hours without a feed, and she will soon regain birthweight.