5 months, weaning and dropping feeds.

[jolls91]

My baby has had terrible reflux, and my HV advised to wean him from 5 months due to this.

He has always been a really hungry baby. He's been drinking around 50oz of hungry baby since around 2 months old. I was initially breastfeeding, but my milk supply just seemed to dry up over night 😔

My little darling is loving food! Last week I had taken him to the doctors as he had quite bad eczema (my husband and step children all suffer with this). My doctor believes he has a cows milk intolerance - the eczema coupled with reflux - and has prescribed nutrimeg.

My son seems to have dropped perhaps 10-15oz out of his feeds per day. I still haven't had a referral to a nutritionist and my doctor didn't seem concerned when he rang to check the other day.

A friend of mine seems to think it might be that he is now getting all the relevant nutrients from the new formula and isn't just disregarding it, as he was previously pooing lots after feeds.

I must say, he's been eating around 2/3 spoons of porridge before adding milk 😳 and perhaps 8-10 small spoons of blended meals in the evening. Which seems a lot for such a little baby. But he's loving it! My mom being old school thinks this is normal.
Any advice?

[CadyEastman]

He could have been wanting the milk in an attempt to settle his stomach. Some babies with CMPA will overfeed, others will get a bottle aversion and underfeed.

I think I would just stick to offering solids once or twice a day now and see how he gets on. It might be that with the introduction of solids and a new milk they agrees with him better, this amount of milk is his new normal.

There's no rush to add in any more meals yet anyway.

The current advice is to move to offering solids 3 times a day between 8 and 9 months

[Fast800]

There is no such thing as cow milk intolerance. There is either cow milk protein allergy, in which case he needs to go dairy free for 6 months, and if your still bf you need to go df. Then he can attempt the milk ladder to reintroduce it. There is also lactose intolerance which means he lacks the enzyme needed to digest the sugar in mammal milk. It’s extreme rare in babies but it is possible. It’s also possible but less so than an adult for him to have developed temporary secondary lactose intolerance due to repeated exposure to something he is allergic to.

nutrimeg isn’t very pleasant, especially compared to bf so it maybe that he just doesn’t like the taste. It also isn’t completely dairy free. There is a great cmpa facebook page. I would ask for advice on there.

[Namechange11223344]

50oz of formula is a lot that’s almost 1.5L, a baby should have 32-35oz a day , obviously every baby is different! What weight are they ?
my lo has bad reflux and developed a bottle aversion at 2 months🥲
she also has eczema (her dad and nearly every one in his immediate family have eczema)
why does your dr think it’s cmpa? Those two symptoms alone shouldn’t be cause for concern of cmpa.
I would do a rain check on the allergy formula.
and in regards to food if he’s a good eater fantastic! My lo is 9 months now (began weaning early via gp advice) and is off formula (her bottle aversion just made it impossible) she has 3 meals a day plus snacks, I paid private for a paediatric dietitian (wait was so long for public) and followed her advice on vitamin D ect.

[jolls91]

@Namechange11223344

It is an awful lot I know. He was 17lb when he was last weighed. He's just a bit above his percentile, and the HV seemed ok with it.
So many of my family were saying I should wean him earlier as he was drinking so much, but my HV said not to bother. So we started at the 5 months.

Well we've been on the new formula for around 3 weeks now. He's upped his bottles, is having about 43oz a day, and two meals. A sachet of something different in the morning, and a blended home made roast in the evenings. It's a lot 😅

My GP showed me a chart of how they check for CMPA, and two or more of the symptoms (reflux and eczema) show a likeliness of cows milk allergy. So they've asked me to use this for 6 weeks and monitor and referred my son to a dietician also.

In all honesty, his reflux did seem to get a bit worse when we swapped to the nutramigen, and his eczema had only mildly improved. But I'm going to persevere for the next 3 weeks and see how it goes.