Reflux meds: do they make for hunger at night?

[Elibean]

..dd2, 13 mos, is on Ranitidine and Domperidone (maximum dose). She also has Laryngomalacia, which can cause sleep apnoea, not to mention teething and endlessly snotty nose, so a million reasons to wake at night but....does anyone know if reflux meds are likely to make food go through her faster, and thus get hungry at night? I think Domperidone is meant to speed up peristalsis, so would that make sense?

She has a good meal at around 5.30-6pm, a big bottle of milk at 6.30/7pm, but nearly always wakes hungry (chugs down as much as we'll let her then straight back to sleep) between midnight and 4am.

Wondering whether its habit or hunger...looks like hunger, but...

My DS was on domperidone and i always wondered about this for the reasons you say ... never really had it confirmed medically though ...

erratic waking is usually hunger and clockwork waking usually habit - as your DD is waking anytime between 12 and 4 it is likley to be hunger

sounds more like habit. My ds came off both R and D at 12 months. He had big appetite and still does! She shouldnt be night feeding at 13 months, IMO it is habitual (not that ive met her!) but i know how hard it is doing ANYTHING to get them to sleep through/stop crying when in so much pain!

if she is not well, and maybe not eating that great during the day then she might not be able to go through the night without a feed. if she is having a milk feed in the night and then settling, i think it answers your question!! how much oyu giving her ?

and 13 months? how can that have gone so quick!!

If they've had bad reflux they may have a lot of catching up to do. My ds couldn't hold anything down until he started domperidome. he was really hungry for a while after it kicked in, but I seem to remember it settled down very quickly. Not sure about the other meds though, is hunger a side effect? Could be just a growth spurt.

(hi lulu!)

Also agree with Lulu - if her appetite is not great in the day then she will need the milk in the night

you can try to reduce the night feed by increasing the amount of food and milk given in the day

also, my DS used to be a real comfort feeder - the milk was soothing on his tum ...

Thanks for thoughts, helps me step back and think about it myself...

She did have lots of catching up to do, and was underweight (dropping down to bottom of chart etc) at 12 months - not because of the reflux so much as some difficulty with solids combined with two D&V bugs in a row.

I'm giving her 120-150 mls at night. Its not possible to give more food during the day, I'm giving her as much as she'll take (on HV's advice) and was told if I give her more milk she could get anaemic. She's taking more than the allotted 600mls per 24 hours as it is.

There probably is an element of habit as well as hunger in there (I know most 13 months old 'shouldn't' be feeding at night any more, but she's a bit of an individual case, this one). But guess we'll have to sort that bit out when my instinct says the hunger part is gone. Sigh.

I think it does make them hungry Elibean as it moved food through the gut faster. Would she have some breakfast cereal at 7 instead of a bottle?

Ooo, Saggars, why didn't I think of that? A late night snack might just help, thank you.

I think we've cleared up the habit v hunger dilemma too, because yesterday she ate particularly well, so went from 7pm till 5am without a feed, woke crying with hunger, had 150mls, then slept till 7.45

Bliss.

Hope so - dd was tube/pump fed for over a year and cutting out feeds at night was abit of a nightmare as she'd got used to never having an empty tum, despite the domperidone. Weetabix last thing at night helped no end.