problems with colic

[Trac]

We have two week old baby who we are bottle feeding (SMA gold and using Avent bottles). He is having a lot of trouble from about 10.00 on a night with colic and cries for hours. Can anyone give us some advice? He was 8 lb 4 oz when he was born and is gulping down his bottles - should we be trying different formula/teats?? Does anyone have any tips on calming babies down who have colic?

Trac - I don't think there is an answer really to getting rid of colic, you just have to try and make it a little less stressful for them and you. My daughter had it for about 4 months and Infacol helped a little but wasn't a magic solution. I just used to lie on the bed with her lying on my stomach, face down, which seemed to help a bit. The crying usually lasted for about 2 hours and I just stroked her back and read a book.

She was breast fed for the first 3 months so don't think breast or bottle feeding had anything to with it. It's just their digestive systems being immature, I think!

Trac - I agree with Tinker, it's a tough phase you and the babe have to get through. Dd1 had similar colic, I found Infacol was very helpful. Also exactly as Tinker describes, lying down with her lying face down on my chest, with me doing deep breathing !! - this seemed to calm her, although was not that comfortable!

I sympathise. It's horrible. Some people tried a special kind of bottle (Dr Brown's??) with success. Others found their baby was lactose intolerant in a major way. My ds had it for some weeks when he was about 6 weeks and it nearly drove us demented but it does stop!!

hi Trac,

All three of my children had badcolic at night especially. With my now 2 yr old I started him on regular similac since my other 2 also did. They all had the same reaction to that one and another formula brand. If I remember right I think it was Isomyl (maybe spelt wrong). They had the same colic problem. With my 3rd I put him on Similac Lactose Free and it really helped more then I could ever imagine. My ds still cant drink any milk with lactose. It seems the other two somewhat outgrew the stomach problem.

Trac - Our baby - now 8 months had it even though she was breastfed. We found that she slept if we put her on her tummy - even though doctors recommended against it. It was the only way she would sleep. I also tried to make sure that we got at least 1 burp out after she ate - sometimes it took a while. That seemed to help. Good luck and congratulations!! Time goes by fast, and the colic will surely pass.

Trac, our 10 week old is quite collicky and infacol does help a bit to get a burp up. My dd was the same and would sleep on her tummy but ds won't so I try to take him to a dark room and rock him with a dummy in his mouth. Sometimes he is worse if he feeds too regularly and as a bf baby I read it can take 3 hrs to digest a feed. However if he's hungry he has to be fed. I am hoping it will pass soon as it is so distressing.

My friends baby had TERRIBLE colic and she eventually tried some drops that had to be put in the bottle about 4 hours before a feed, it helped tremendously - will get in touch with her if you want to try them

Am kicking myself as I used those drops that JaneyT mentioned - and cannot for the life of me remember what they were called !

They sell them in some pharmacies but they are quite expensive - about £7 for a tiny bottle, but it lasts a few weeks as you only use two drops per bottle. You have to make the bottles up in advance and let them sit for s few hours with the drops in the milk - so it can be logistically tricky - but I found they worked really really well for my dd. They work by starting to break down the lactose so the milk is easier for baby to digest.

I also tried the Dr Brown's bottles and they also seemed to help.

I'd try both together !

Will try and find that name for you now and post again if I am successful !

Aha - remembered before I even got as far as searching ! They are called COLIEF.

One other thing that occurred to me - and it may not work in your case - looking back at dd's first few weeks we think now that a lot of her "colic crying" might really have been tired crying - and before we started following Gina Ford we never lay her down and left her to go to sleep crying. Once we started doing that her colic seemed to get a lot better - so I don't know whether she really had colic or not !

Might be worth a go anyway ?

HTH ?

We tried Mylecon drops - which didn't work v. well.

Sacond Cranial Osteopathy, I know a fair number of people who've had colicy babes and it's helped them all. My dd2 had it for other reasons and it did work, honest!

Trac

I agree with JaneyT and Scatterbrain. I used the colief drops and they did seem to help.

another vote for cranial osteopathy, I literally walked out of the surgery with a different baby.

Colief seemed to work for us but, like Scatterbrain, I felt that some of the crying was due to over-tiredness at the end of the day. It improved once we got ds into a good daytime routine. Hope you find a solution to the problem.

we found that gripe water was helpful, and our daughter liked the taste of it too.

cranial osteopathy, oh the powerful force of placebo again pity they charge for it though

sorry that was very naughty of me.

We tried everything; Dr Brown Bottles, Infacol, Colief, and Cranial Osteopathy at 8 weeks. I think that the osteo did work but who knows! She was much better after 3 sessions and I remember remarking if I had picked up the wrong baby as this one was much happier. I also agree with one of the other posts that she was overtired but would fight it - so maybe getting a good routine (I reccomend Gina Ford's). I had twins and my little girl is still more intense, intelligent and can fight sleep even now they are both 19 months old, so maybe its personality. But it soon passes, good luck.