Advice

[Alamaya]

Hi All,
Never posted on this board but someone recommended in the past.

I have a 14 1/2 week old. To be very brief he was born footling breech very quick labour. 6lb 13oz A week after birth got admitted to hospital as lost 10% of weight and i mentioned he had twitching episodes. Docs informed us they were seizures.

Had an MRI and found he had bleeds on the brain from his birth. They are not convinced though the fits are linked.

Always been a poor feeder only taking an oz a time and we would have to wake him in the night. No one really took me seriously about his weight.

8 weeks old - he has another set of seizures, we get admitted and while there they say hes thin and put him on high cal formula and fitting meds.

12 weeks old. After weeks and weeks of me saying im not happy with his feeding, with him now being sick and weight being very low i go to the hospital and demand to be seen to be told my sons malnourished and severely underweight we were admitted immediately at 7lb 13oz and after a few days of observation of feeds (they even got nurses to feed him instead of me) said they were tube feeding him, he also had a sly fit in hospital. They also found him to have reflux and put on meds for it.

So here we are now at 14 weeks. Hes now bottle fed and topped up by tube each feed. No more fits as of yet but due to the malnourishment hes very delayed physically. They hope that once he gets some weight on him he will catch up and we just have to pray the bleeds have not delayed him on a permanent basis.

My advice question is this. We have been told to do lots of tummy time as he cant lift his own head when lying down and even when sitting it just jerks forward. He screams during tummy time doesnt lift his head at all. Is there anything anyone can think of exercise or something wise that would gently encourage him to try to use his neck. Hes gaining weight now but not sure how long we are going to have to wait for him to catch up. We are now 8lb 7.5oz.

All of mine (SN or otherwise) detested tummy time. You could try making the tummy time in the air? you'd hold him gently over the length of your arm, like a tiger cub on a tree branch, then gently sort his head but allow him to take a little of the weight.

I hope they sort him soon.

What Lougle said.

Don't distress the poor baby, just let him take a little bit of the weight of his head for short periods when you are holding him and doing other things.

My first 2 hated tummy time and I was a bit obsessed by it. My 3rd is now 8 months and your post is the first I've thought about it, though he holds his head up well and scoots about the floor looking up now. It was nothing I 'did', except follow his lead and let him get on with his own development happily.

I used to have to hold DS2 in the air over my arm in the 'tiger in a tree' hold, as the above poster suggested. Eventually he would lift his head while on my arm. After that, he was ok on the floor for tummy time.

He had different issues, but his mobility was still impaired and delayed.

He lifted his head whilst in the tiger in a tree hold for the first time at 11 months old.

He eventually took his first steps at 3y7mo. He's now 9yo and runs around all the time!