Unsettled after feed

[LaurenMitch]

Hi,

Sorry for the long post but we are in need of support. 2 very tired parents here.

Our daughter is 1 month old and formula fed.

Over the past couple of weeks we have noticed the following during and then after a feed - mostly on an evening:

Going red in the face
Making straining noises despite not passing stools during this time
Increasingly squirmy
Putting her hands to her mouth (to signify needing food) however will then spit the bottle out
Occasionally sicking milk back up (more than just spitting up)

Is at times soothed when held up-right on our shoulder, but will not settle when placed on her back - even after a long duration following feed.

We have attempted the following:

Winding after feeding - doesn't seem to pass significant wind all of the time
Smaller more frequent feeds
Feeding more upright and sitting upright after feed

We have been told this is infant dyschezia, however we do not believe this relates to constipation as soiled nappies are pretty regular.

No concerns with growth. Attending weekly clinic to be weighed and growth is steady.

Any further advice please?

Lauren and Mitch

Could be a dairy allergy as mine was always in agony with the wind it gave him and lying flat made it worse. Also CMPA doesn't always have to cause rashes or eczema. Mine only ever had stomach problems, never with his skin. Or possibly reflux, though I don't have experience of that

Hi, we did think this, however doesn't seem to happen after every feed. It is usually the feeds from 5/6pm onwards.

First time parents so we are very new to it all.

One thing I’ve learned from our 2 DD’s is that if they don’t bring much wind up, keep winding them. Try almost having them sat on your hand, other hand supporting their head & chin & kind of wiggle their bum/rock back & forth (you may need to YouTube a video for this lol). Brilliant for thoroughly winding them.

Sounds like reflux to me. The wanting to suck after a feed is to sooth the discomfort from the reflux feeding makes it feel better but also then causes more reflux and discomfort.
Keep with keeping him upright, small frequent feeds.
I have a 5 year old who had severe reflux and allergies and now have a 5 week old showing some of the signs too. We are definitely having some feed reflux feed scream cycles. Evening is worse, skin to skin seems to help. I'm not doing full skin to skin but unbuttoning his sleepsuit so I can put a hand under his vest on his back/tummy or taking our arms out of our clothes so he has bare shoulders and have have bare arms so there's skin to skin where I'm holding him. We have also started with a dummy just a few minutes if he's fussy after a feed to see if he's after more milk or a bit of comfort.

He's breastfed and I have a fast letdown and stopping frequently through our the feed to stem the flow a little bit and allow him to keep control over the amount of milk he's drinking. I'd maybe try giving her pauses during the evening feeds.

Hi,

Thank you so much for your response.

We did query whether it might be the symptoms of reflux but couldn't be certain.

She seems to feed just fine in the night, however the afternoon/ evening feeds are when the symptoms really increase which can be really distressing as we just feel so hopeless at times.

Would this only happening in afternoon/ evening still signify a reflux type issue?

All the best.

With my daughter it started with the occasional feed but by about 8-9 weeks it was all the time. My son at the moment has been ok overnight but some of the day time has been tricky. Yesterday it was the morning and today it's been the afternoon, before bed has been more consistent