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Weaning

Find weaning advice from other Mumsnetters on our Weaning forum. Use our child development calendar for more information.

Original poster

Constipation!

10 replies

blushingmare · 09/01/2013 09:08

Poor dd (7mo) is really suffering with it at the moment! Confused Any tips on what to give her? Or what to avoid?

We are more or less doing BLW. She often has prunes and dried apricots as part of her breakfast and she eats quite a bit of fruit throughout the day - it's probably the thing that goes down the most, rather than on the floor! She also loves yoghurt and has plain natural live yoghurt daily, that she self feeds.

Should she be having more water? I always encourage her to have a few sips with each meal, but she doesn't have much. I keep reading about water being important for constipation, but she is breastfed on demand and I find it hard to see how water is any better than breastmilk.

She won't be spoonfed, so I can't spoon loads of prune purée into her!

OP posts:
noblegiraffe · 09/01/2013 09:15

How bad is the constipation? My DS developed constipation at weaning and all the prunes and orange juice in the world wouldn't tempt him to go. Trips to the docs, twice daily lactulose, glycerin suppositories when he hadn't been for 3 days to force him to go and the problem was finally gone two years later.

Hopefully it won't be like that for you, but if she goes for longer than a few days without going (we went at 9 days) then you need to get to the docs as the back-up stretches the bowel and exacerbates the problem.

Original poster
blushingmare · 09/01/2013 09:40

Ok thanks for the heads up noble - your poor ds Hmm Luckily we're not that bad yet - she's only gone a couple of days, but she has lots of painful and distressed straining and proper "logs" in her nappies (tmi sorry!). She was previously a big liquid poo after almost every bf baby, so this is a very sudden change.

OP posts:
Poledra · 09/01/2013 10:11

Google 'reflexology for constipated babies' or something like that - there's videos on YouTube showing how to do it. DD1 had terrible problems with constipation (she was eventually diagnosed with an immature bowel, and was on medication till she was about 5) but my midwife showed me how to do reflexology on her when she was tiny (still Bfed) and it did give her some relief. And, even if it doesn't work for her, she's still had a nice foot massage Smile

Poledra · 09/01/2013 10:13

And yes re previous poster's point on overstretched bowel - the paed we saw said that DD1's bowel was now 'used' to being overstretched and we had to 're-educate' it to recognise when it was full and needed emptying, IYSWIM.

SwivelHips · 09/01/2013 13:31

Blushing - can I ask you how you give the prunes/dried apricots? DS is on day 2 with no poo and I was thinking of getting some prunes for him. Also doing BLW so would i just give him a prune?

Poledra · 09/01/2013 14:03

Swivel, do you give your baby porridge at all? I used to soften some dried prunes and apricots in hot water in a pan for a moment, then puree them and mix a spoonful of the puree with DD1's morning porridge.

JiltedJohnsJulie · 09/01/2013 14:10

Are you bfing an hour before solids and have you tried an extra bf or two?

Original poster
blushingmare · 09/01/2013 17:50

Swivel I poach them in milk (2 mins in the microwave) to soften them a little and then allow them to cool a bit before giving them to her. They smell delicious and make the milk sweet, which I drink myself use to make her Readybrek.

Jilted yes I generally aim for giving solids an hour after bf roughly speaking, although it doesn't always work out like that. She feeds on demand fairly regularly (2-3 hours) throughout the day regardless of solids intake - definitely not dropped any feeds!

OP posts:
mrscog · 09/01/2013 22:15

DS is 10Mo and has had various problems over the past few weeks - culmulating in some terrible anal fissures which then led to the vicious cycle of him holding on due to pain then this makes the problem worse and round and round it goes.

What's helped is prunes - I gave him 14 the other day and today they've finally had an effect! I give tinned prunes though - they're soft and mashable as they are - you just have to fish the stones out before serving. The other thing I've done is encouraged sips of water after every 3-5 mouthfuls of food, and I've offered lots of water adn BF throughout the day. I've also sitirred in an extra 30mls of water into each meal - barely enough to change the texture but over a day that's 3 extra oz of fluid.

FInally, apparently increasing their fat intake can help make the stools greasier so I've also been making sure I'm generous with butter/olive oil etc. in DS's food. I even let him eat a whole shortbread the other day!

SwivelHips · 10/01/2013 10:13

Cheers blushing I'll give that a go, came home yesterday pruneless again so I'll try again today.
Poledra: yes he does have baby porridge, but the pack just about finished so I was thinking of readybrek to replace it. He's never been that keen on it, much prefers weetabix but either way I'll give that a go too
:)
Oh mrs cog that must've been very painful for him. DS was screaming last night and produced a marble at the end of it, we just felt so blinking helpless. He had great success this morning though when I removed his nappy, 2 whoppers only just missed the carpet Shock

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