What is wrong with my 9 week old baby boy!!

[KatieLouLou]

I have a nine week old son who has been a nightmare since birth. If I did not have friends and relatives with babies then I think I would have put this down to just being a baby, but I have been told by others that his crying is excessive. I breast fed him for 5 weeks, but he was literally feeding constantly with one feed running into another, and I also could not put him down - he would only sleep on me. This is when I made the decision to change to formula. I started him on Aptamil and it was like a diff baby - I could now leave the house and I knew exactly how much he had fed, so if he cried I knew it was not hunger. This worked for a while and then the screaming started again - ended up in A + E one night as was so bad - the doctor said prob reflux and prescribed Gaviscon Infant. Again, this worked for a few days and then the screaming returned. At six week check doc said he could be cows milk protein intolerant ( I was as a child too). Changed his milk to Nutramigen 1 and again, vast improvement for a few days and then back to square one. I am at the end of my tether now as to what is the matter. He hates going in his pram/ sling and hardly sleeps during the day resulting in him being exhausted by the evening, causing even more crying!!! if anyone has any advice it would be much appreciated. PS. I'm new to this so sorry if I have not used all the abbreviations etc!!

You have my sympathies, the first few weeks are sooo hard. Sounds like you have had loads of good advice about feeds and such.

The only thing i wanted to add is don't underestimate just how much LO's can cry due to tiredness, even at the beginning of day. When DD was a similar age i took her to the GP convinced that something was terribly wrong, she used to cry so much and sounded like she was in agony. In her case it turned out that she had stopped going off to sleep on her own when she needed to, but actually could only cope with about an hour awake at a time. She needed to go back to sleep about three quarters of an hour after she first woke in the morning for her 1st nap, and then nap about 4 or 5 times again during the day. If i got the 1st nap in, the rest of the day always seemed easier. We managed this with a combination of a sling, car and buggy rides. I became obsessed by sleep! Eventually i learnt to recognise her sleep signs and if she was put down quickly enough went off on her own.

I guess if sleep is just part of the problem, but something you can work on now so to speak, it might help things to be bearable.

Good luck, make sure you rest when you can. It will get better!

Well I'm not sure what to make of the cranial osteopathy - he loved it at first and then started screaming half way through - at which point I just wanted to grab my son off the man and leave!!!! But I didn't!! He did a huge poo in the middle of it all which I don't think helped matters. When we left he was just looking at me with a "WTF!!!! just happened to me sort of look!' but when we got home he cried a lot ( I was told this may be a consequence and thought I might be in for a rough night), but when I got round to putting him to bed he went out like a light! Today he has been a bit grim but that is pretty normal for him. I am actually beginning to think that I should just accept the way he is - my health visitor has advised keeping him on the Nutramigen so I will give it a go. Booked baby massage and yoga classes as was told that might help too, has anyone else tried this? Apparently helps to calm them and help with wind x

Baby massage is fantastic with wind

katie, baby massage is great and there are some techniques in baby yoga which can help with a fussy baby. (I am a baby yoga teacher)

Sometimes I think we are all searching for reasons and cures for crying. In my experience, there are just no answers sometimes and all you can do is soothe the best you can and tough it out. It will get better! Slings and cuddles etc, warm baths with your baby and massage are prob what I would persevere with. Perhaps look up some Dr Sears advice - he seems to be the one who gives you a million things to try while still admitting that some babies just cry a lot and are unsettled and there can be just no real reason. You are a great mum and soon your baby will reward you for all your hard work. xxx

Gosh, this is what my son was like. He was such hard work. There were times that I had to put him down and walk away as he was crying regardless of what I did. He's 2 now and still willful and fussy but it's more containable. Having had 4 kids I can see clearly that kids do come with software pre-loaded. It may be that your DS is just going to be a very strong determined character from the outset and over time you will learn to handle him. It's one of those classic 'time will tell' scenarios.

Get the Baby Whisperers book - I remeber seeing her on TV changing a babys life completely and it's poor mothers - she got special cushions for it to sleep propped up and used special bottles and fed it a certain way - have no experience my self but it seemed to work - HTH.

My DD was the same until she was about 16 weeks old.

She is still on Gaviscon at 8 months.

Everything worked for a few days and then it would be back to the crying.

I think it is tummy related (with her)

Have you tried colief?

In the end, we tried everything for a few days and would then go back to something else and eventually we made it to 16 weeks

Good luck

We tried cranial therapy and it didnt work for us, but it might for you.