What would you do?

[Intotheforest]

Hi ladies, I'm new to MN and looking for some advice. My DD is seven weeks old. She has had issues with tongue tie which has now been cut and she is seeing an osteopath to help with adjustments. Before the tongue tie snip, she was fussy when feeding and crying a lot of the time. The doctor suspected reflux and prescribed omeprazole. Over the last few weeks, she has had periods of being more settled. We weee having her settled and asleep for half ten/eleven and the evening crying episodes we frequently experienced were not as intense. The problem though was that her dirty nappies reduced from several a day to maybe two per week. I decided to ween her off the omeprazole as I don't want to be giving her such a powerful drug if it's not definitely what she needs and wanted to see if now the tongue issues were sorted if she could be off the medication. I spoke to the GP about this and he agreed. I halved the dose for three days, halved it again for two then gave her none. She's had none now for four days. The past three days haven't been great. She's crying in the evening for hours and is very difficult to settle. She is fighting sleep most of the afternoon and is awake for long periods. Last night she was unsettled from 4:30pm and didn't finally go to sleep until after midnight. She is fully breastfed. Some feeds are fussy where she bobs her head and thrashes. Some feeds are ok (not as many). She is sometimes sick after feeds but not always. Nappies are normal colour/consistency. Weight gain is ok - average 5oz per week. I've cut out dairy. Last night she was making awful choking type sounds when I put her down and grunting. Her cot is slightly elevated at one end. She always seems to sneeze and hiccup and has a snuffley nose. I don't know if it's reflux, over tiredness, wind, a developmental phase? I don't know what to do. Has anyone experienced anything similar or have any advice? Thank you.

Hi,
Sounds fairly similar to my lo. He's now 11 months and he is still medicated for reflux. took ages to confirm CMPA and he also has FPIES to fish. Several lesser allergies also suspected. It also took me ages to accept him being on reflux meds- we didn't really put him on them properly until he was 5 months and the difference was huge. Although still hard to see until retrospectively- as you say, could be developmental etc etc.

Looking back, I wish I had started them earlier. If it's allergy related posseting etc, then the meds won't harm anyway. It takes ages to eliminate food and we had to eliminate eggs, soya, nuts, beef etc for a while. Until we began weaning, and when he got the huge FPIES reaction to fish, it was all trial and elimination and guess work. Even then he still has reflux alongside!

Every baby is different and things change so quickly. I hope things settle soon- and that this makes some kind of sense, sorry typing as ds is grabbing my phone and wriggling!

Also he was permanently congested and hiccuped a lot of times a day. Didn't notice it stopping at the time but it definitely followed me eliminating dairy from my diet- bit took a while.

Thank you. That's really helpful. I've got a gp appointment this afternoon so going to see what he says. It's so hard to know what to do for the best. Was your little one particularly unsettled on an evening? She's fine when I eventually get her to sleep but getting her to go to sleep is another story. Did you wean earlier with regards to allergies and did you exclusively breast feed? Sorry for all of the questions!

Hey, not at all. Really glad if I can help even a little as looking back, I realise how hard it was.

Yes, but he was quite unsettled all day also. It was less noticeable as I fed on demand (he was exclusively breastfed) and we carried him in the sling a lot. He was a nightmare to settle (I just thought it was normal) and he would be sick over night a lot too, taking ages to go back down after feeds. I remember buying loads of extra pillow cases as we didn't have enough Moses basket sheets to get through the night.

I was told ridiculous things by a succession of locum gps, such as bf babies can't have allergies, he has a cold (now I've experienced a baby's cold, he definitely didn't) the black flecks in his nappies (digested blood) were flecks picked up from the floor (???!)
as first time parents, we didn't really know what to think and didn't want to label what the doctors were saying was normal baby behaviour. When ds started having blood in his poo and vomiting bile, then we were sent to a and e and the diagnosis process started. Even then it wasn't simple however.

Things which helped were the reflux meds, cutting dairy and a number of other foods, keeping a food diary for myself and eventually weaning. I was advised to wean early by the gp but I chose not to, as I'd read about increased risk of allergies etc. It would have helped his reflux sooner however he simply wasn't ready to eat even at six months. He couldn't sit up unaided until 7 1/2 months and it was only following that, that he actually became interested in food.

I joined the cmpa support group on Facebook which was so helpful- there is one for breastfed babies too. The women on there have a wealth of knowledge and are really helpful.

Really hope the gp was helpful today!

Thank you again. The GP said he thinks it's acid related and has given her ranitidine to try. Which medication were you using?