Constipation fixes for 11 month DD

[Birdies]

My DD is on 3 meals a day plus some snacks and she has about 500mls of formula milk a day. She has water on and off throughout the day (usually a few sips here and there though I've no idea if it's enough - is there a right amount?).

Main question is whether I can do anything to help her poo more easily - she gets upset and really struggles and by the size and hardness of them when they eventually come out I'm not surprised. She has lots of veg and fruit purees a day so I'm not sure what to do but I hate seeing her so uncomfortable.

Thanks :)

What is her diet like?

I'd cut down the millk, especially if it is follow on. Lots of fruit, oranges are particularly good, also prunes and dried apricots. Cut out bananas and bread to see if that helps, and lots of water.

She has usually two hot meals a day with lot of veg in them. Fruit purée, yoghurt and usually oaty porridge for breakfast. The thing is as I've cut the formula milk down the problem has got worse (it's not follow on though). I will try fruits like prunes and oranges though as haven't done that before. Thanks

Sounds like she isn't drinking enough then. You can add a little squash or juice to the water to encourage her.

Pear helps my DD.

DD2 had terrible constipation at that age, mostly because she ate everything going. So I blended loads of prunes and added them to just about all of her meals. It definitely helped. Lots of fluids help too.

I got advice that too much roughage and fibre can cause problems and was advised to cut back on wholemeal and high fibre and feed more refined cereals and less vegetables. It helped DD.

We had a bit of a constant balancing act with DD's poo situation!

Between weaning at around 6mo and 1yr it was a struggle, as she loved everything she ate, but didn't really get the hang of the drinking cup properly for quite a while, so she just wasn't drinking enough. Approaching 1yr we suddenly had a bit of a breakthrough and she was emptying a cup of water when normally we thought she would have had about a third. We then felt able to ease off on milk as she was getting fluids elsewhere. Second big breakthrough was raisins! She loves them (like sweeties to her really) and they seem to help.

I try and make sure she has a pot of fruit puree every day (she doesn't eat much actual real fruit yet for some reason), a good handful of raisins in her snack pot, and a 'normal' level of veg in her meals (e.g. something vegetably at lunch and dinner).

She seems to have balanced out a bit now (15 mo, but probably fine since about 13mo), but I would say on the whole she has always been a bit digestively challenged so I think her body is just taking a bit longer to get to grips with things. Next step is to move to cow's milk, but it was such a disaster last time we tried that we're procrastinating.

D

Thought I would report back! In the end I went for a mix of prunes (2 a day chopped and mixed into her porridge) and a few sultanas....and the problem is now fixed! Thanks again for all the great advice