Hi,
Im looking for a bit of advice, my baby is now 11 weeks old and weighs 4.2kg which she has weighed for the past 3 weeks. Well actually she was 4.3kg last week and now is 4.2. She was 5lb when she was born at 37 weeks. By her 2 week app she was 5lb 8oz, by one month 6lb 10oz, 6 weeks 7lbs 9oz, then 8 weeks 9lbs and 9 weeks 9lb 2oz, she got up to 9lb 8oz last week but her weight gain is faltering and now she’s losing and back down to 9lb 4. She is exclusively breast fed and fed on demand until she comes off herself. I always offer her the other breast and for the most part she takes it allbeit for less time. Until about 8 weeks she had 6 bowel movements a day and the same or more amount of wet nappies. Then at 8 weeks she started having fewer poops but would have larger clear out ones. Her wet nappies stayed the same. She had tongue tie and that was cut at 3 weeks. Whilst she had tongue tie and for a little after I fed her using nipple shields, since about 5 weeks she has been completely off the shields. She spits up quite a bit and it has coincided with coming off the shields, I’ve mentioned it countless times to the GP and every time I have been dismissed with a ‘wait and see’ approach. Last week she started choking on her spit up which has led her to be prescribed gaviscon and quite honestly it doesn’t seem to be working but they told me it takes 4/5 weeks to start working.
She has Bronchiolitis at the moment so her appetite is affected but the slowing down of weight gain isn’t just linked to that. But her appetite is in the toilet so it’s likely she will lose more weight.
I cannot work out why her weight gain is faltering. Her appetite has also decreased and her feed time has also decreased since coming off the shields. Until about 2 weeks ago she would typically take 4.5 oz ( expressed BM) now these past 2 weeks it’s down to 3/3.5, she had one instance of having 6oz but that’s a fluke. She also barely drains by breasts in the morning and spits up heavily then, I guess I’m quite full in the morning, so I tend to express the extra off. I hold her up for a minimum of 30 mins after a feed too. Her nappies are normal, she’s alert, smiley, tries to talk to you, when she feels like it she can push herself up on her tummy, she pushes down with her feet when you hold her but she is not gaining weight anymore and I can’t figure out why.
The doctors have said she’s on her curve which is the 1st centile so it’s all good, but they can’t seem to grasp that she was moving off that and growing and now that’s stopped. It’s incredibly infuriating and obviously not normal. She’s 56.5cm in length (around 20th centile) and has a hc of 38cm (also around 20th).
I try to put her to the breast often every 3 hours in the day and I don’t let her go more than 4 hours at night without feeding, but at points it seems like she doesn’t want it as she starts screaming and pushing away and her eyes start drooping and she falls asleep so I’ve taken this as ‘mum I’m tired, leave me alone you are annoying me I want to sleep’. She does the same with the bottle from time to time. So top up feeds of whatever don’t work, especially considering the amount she spits up.
I’m wondering if my milk doesn’t have the calories? If she should go back on the nipple shields (although that was such a faff). Should I combi feed, or give up breastfeeding as it’s not giving her what she needs? Should I ask about high calorie formula? I spoke to a children’s centre midwife who said it’s slow weight gain that needs to be addressed but my HV is like oh she’s on her curve and like I said it’s infuriating.
I’m at a complete loss here, does anyone know? Or had similar experiences?