Week of diarrhea following 3rd Vaccine - Any advice

[MumQ8]

Hi all,

Has anyone had experience with this that can offer some advice. My DS had his vaccine the 3rd, menb and the 6in1 a week ago. He is juat over four months now. Since the day of the vaccine he started with a mild fever (I know.totally normal), and just been so poorly since then. Very fussy crying a lot. And a lot of diarrhea, he has had 16 poops today alone since 6am. And has lost a huge amount of weight, his ribs are sticking out, chubby baby belly gone, its flat with excess skin. 111 said to see a GP as he hasn't had blood. We had to wait a week to see the GP as they said a week is normal.

Saw the Dr today and he just said I need to wait for the diarrhea to end. And then he would gain weight back. But this seem ridiculous.

His poos are liquid and some like jelly, between the normal colour and green. He is breastfed and it goes in and comes out. I'm on a vegan diet for the past two months as he had a reflux issues so just cut lactose out in case. I've changed nothing in diet, we haven't gone anywhere, seen anyone. Partner works from home.

It just doesn't seen okay to me, he doesn't even play just cries feeds, poops, baths and sleeps. Wakes a lot crying all day and night. This has truly been a week from hell waiting to see the Dr as I was advised to wait a week, to see if it stopped. And now I feel even more desperate for help.

My GP told me that green poo can be rotavirus (wild type, not just the vaccine strain).

I would personally go back to GP, and get your health visitor to support you, especially if your baby is struggling to gain,/losing weight.

You should also talk to your GP about whether you can/should give oral rehydration solution. Diaroltye do one that helps with diarrhoea too and it says it is suitable from 3 months, but I would want the GP to say ok if it were me. You can give 5ml slowly in a Calpol syringe as well as breastfeeding.

I know how worrying these things are. At 5 months, my baby caught COVID, was projectile vomiting and we ended up in A&E on a Friday night. They are so little and you need to look after them. You know your baby best in the end - if you are concerned, go back and say so.

Breastmilk is naturally full of lactose so cutting out dairy wont help reduce lactose levels. Wonder if lactase drops might help as stomach problems can cause a temporary lactose intolerance and the drops help break down the lactose in your milk.

Thanks so much for the advise appreciate it.

Lactose intolerance is pretty rare and makes breastfeed babies quite poorly.
Cows milk protein allergy is much more common and about half of babies with a cows milk allergy are allergic to soya.
I was mostly vegetarian when I was breastfeeding my daughter and when I did a food diary there was a very strong correlation between her reflux symptoms and me eating soya based meat replacements ... Which I ate more off when I had had a difficult day with her screaming with reflux and ended in quite a pickle!
My daughter had an increase in loose stools following each of her vaccines but I would expect they would have started to improve by a week. She also had loose stools due to allergies, if you have removed all dairy it might be worth looking at soya too. I went dairy and soya free then day of her 4 month jabs.

@Superscientistthanks so much, I'll cut soya out. I wasn't aware there was a link. Appreciate rhe advice. We in the second week now, but I have got a sample sent to a lab. So hopefully on Thursday I'll have more.

@OtterMummy2024 you called it, DC does indeed have rotavirus, my DC is sadly very poorly, has lost so much weight we back in new newborn nappies, ribs sticking out, not more belly or chubby belly. Dr's have said they will hospitalise DC if he has not turned the corner by Monday, which is so frustrating, and upsetting considering his condition. Anyways I came to update and say thank you again for the advice.

Ah sorry to hear it. I lost 2kg myself after catching it from my baby last month. We had a saga to get baby diagnosed by the GP (lost samples...).

I really hope your baby starts to improve soon, my baby only needed oral rehydration & Calpol & sleep but is older (pros - will drink ORS happily, cons - no longer breastfeeding so I couldn't top baby back up that way!).

Do keep an eye on your LO, as you already are. If you think they need seeing again before Monday, get the OoH GP or go to A&E. With a confirmed rotavirus diagnosis they will take you much more seriously than 'just' an unknown viral tummy bug (it shouldn't be that way but unfortunately it is!).

Just from my own experience I would look at a private genetic test you can do at home to determine if your son carries the MTHFR genes.

I believe 40% of the population do but it helped me to make the decision not to vaccinate dd again and do certain things to detox her.

Sorry to hear that, that's so awful it's a horrible illness. We also have had a saga, we just requested a different Dr.

Sorry to hear that you weren't able to breastfeed after. But I'm glad your DC got well. And thanks so much I really appreciate that. We just going to go into A&E tomorrow, there has been no improvement. So hopefully we can get some extra help.

Thanks so much for the suggestion, I'll definitely read up about it. Do you have a recommendation of a clinic that sends those kits to do the home tests?

I would suggest joining the MTHFR Gene Mutation facebook group to read up about the vaccine links and find the best cost effective test. My dd is 25 so anything I did will be seriously out of date now.

Unfortunately if you go via your GP they tend to be completely dismissive about the potential links.

You could perhaps consider raising a yellow card post vaccination with your GP to try and get them to take this more seriously.

I do hope your son is improving now.

Sorry just seen he isn’t improving, so yellow carding is a good idea.

@stayathomegardener thanks so much for the information I really appreciate it. That's perfect I'll look into it. The GPs love to dismiss a lot unfortunately. Thanks I didn't even know about the yellow card, I'll definitely report it to the scheme. Hopefully A&E will be helpful.