Posted by
bbvv
19 yrs ago
For the past month, it takes an hour for my son (he will be 6mths next Sat) to drink up his formula milk (7floz). Normally at the beginning of each feed, he takes in around 3 to 4floz fairly quickly and then uses his tongue to stick out the bottle teat or uses his hands to take the bottle away from his mouth. It's a signal to burp him and afterwards we try to feed the remaining milk, however, each time he turns his head away, cries or shuts his mouth real hard. We end up having to rock him to sleep to feed him but when he is in a deeper sleep he does not drink at all. Everyday, for 2 feed or 3 feeds, only half is drunken and I am worried that this will affect his weight as he was born weighing only 2.46kg. Feeding schedule is 7am, 11am, 3pm, 7pm and 11pm.
Does anyone have any advice that they can give me inorder to encourage him to drink or reduce the time of feed.
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HI bbvv,
Every child is different, but taking 1 hour to drink 7oz is not very good. (normally, according to the ped, a baby should finish 1 feed maximum, 30 minutes.) My baby finishes his 8 oz-9 0z milk in 15 minutes. When he was younger, 6 months-9 months, he still needs that one break (burp) in the middle... now he's 1 year old, of course, he just drinks all at once.
Some things for you to look into as possible problems:
1) The teats are too slow? If it takes so long to drink the milk, it's possible the teats are too slow for him already. By 15 minutes of sucking, babies are tired, so they stop. They aren't hungry at this point anymore, but not full. But tired. So that's the most likely problem.
2) The teats you are using are new, and too hard? My ped told me new teats (silicon ones) need to be boiled for 20 minutes, when they are new, then rinse under cold water, then boil again 20 minutes, and rinse again... for about 3 -4 times, then the teat will be soft, baby will like it much better.
Have you started solids too ? It will help him gain weight too. by 4-5 months, they have have simple solids, and simply fruits and cereals (single grains).
Hope this will help.
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dear bbvv,
my baby iss now 10 months. totally understand your situation. i have always struggled to feed my baby milk - new teats, bottles, split feeds, you name it i tried it. think i started lots of thread about this topic on this forum before!
sometimes he would only drink 60ml in like 1 hour! you can imagine my frustration.
so when i told the doctor, the advice was to introduce solids and add the formula into the food, especially in the beginning when you need liquids to make the purees.
so at 5 months, i started giving him solids and the milk feeds were reduced.
now we are at 2 bottle feeds (am and bedtime). he is now 10 months so it's ok because from this stage, he should be eating more and drinking less milk. his 2 milk feeds plus his milk in breakfast meets the min. daily milk requirement for his age.
i was soooo worried when he didn't want to drink his milk. but looking back, although he wasn't very big at birth, he looks like a real puffed up ball in pictures taken during his milk refusal days. and he slept through the night so he was obviously getting enough. so it was all the stress and tension for nothing.
so my advice is let him drink what he wants, as long as he sleeps through the night, he is probably getting enough fluids. but at 6 months, you could start some solids (BUT PLEASE SEEK ADVICE FROM YOUR BABY'S DOCTOR FIRST). stuff like single grain cereals,sweet potatoes, bananas, avocados, etc...what i did was add formula to the foods just before feeding.
i know it's very distressing but don't worry, it shouldn't last forever!
:)
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bbvv
19 yrs ago
Thanks for your advice. Last weekend, we tried a little bit of rice cereal mixed with formula milk and he spat it out. We will try again this weekend. As for the silicon teat - we are using the fastest setting (Avent variable one for 3mths onwards) so I don't think this is a problem. He used to be able to drink up his milk in 10mins flat then it went onto half and hour and now an hour. We sometimes stop after 45 mins as it is not good rewarming milk all the time. My son does not like his milk cold.
Can I ask if I puree fruits like banana and avocados - do I mush it up first then add the formula milk into it. Does it have to be warm or cold. For timesaving sake - for single vegetables - do I use a blender to chop it up, add water, boil, leave to cook and put in ice-cube trays with a lid to freeze - how long can I keep in freezer? I've never really pureed any food in my life.
I'm a full-time worker and my husband looks after bubs during the day as he works from home - I bath and feed him in the evenings. We have a filipino domestic helper but do not trust her with the bubs - will be terminating her at the end of the month for various reasons. Our new one should arrive after the Chinese New Year but we will not be relying on the maid to look after him as my husband is happy doing this and I take over in the weekends - maybe the odd breaks here and there.
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crj
19 yrs ago
Check this thread on starting solids... I wrote out everything we did the first 2 weeks.
Yes avocado and banana are wonderful first foods, just mashed avocado mixed with some formula and warmed a bit..
http://hongkong.asiaxpat.com/forums/momsdads/threads/85714.asp
After you start things like sweet potatoes and other veggies, you can do the ice cube tray method, we do this it is great. Fod can be in zip lock freezer bags for up to 3 months (but it never lasts that long!)
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We encountered this problem as well with all our children. Seemslike there's a stage where they just got tired of the 'taste' of the milk (maybe)... :P
Anyway, what we did was, to dilute the formula a little bit. Reduce 1 or 2 spoons from the usual measurements. Thinner milk will flow out easier even without them sucking. We did this until they seemed to 'like' drinking milk again. It took about 2 weeks time.
Hope this helps :)
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bbvv
19 yrs ago
Hi micchira, i will try your method and see how it goes. Yes, Ruth at Clifford - it does seem like a battle at the moment. After his first half of milk and burping he seems to want to take a long rest before drinking the remaining half hence the hour long.
Tried to give him a bit of rice cereal mixed with formula milk again and he doesn't seem to like it. I've tasted it and it's a little sweet from the formula milk. I'm using Earth's Best organic rice cereal and followed their instruction of mixing 1 tablespoon with 4 tablespoon of formula milk. Do you think I need to add a bit more formula to make it runnier?
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I always added more formula (in the beginning) so it reached the consistency of runny congee :) then increase the thickness every few days until it reached the suggested measurement.
And if I remember correctly, I didn't even start with 1 tbs but 1 or 2 tsp only. Therefore not too much to throw when they didn't finish it :P
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Hi,
One thing your question didn't say was whether this was a recent problem or one that you've had the whole time throughout.
Have been on this forum plenty of times probably harping on about the same thing. My son (who is now 14 months) had a drinking 'problem' for the first few months of his life where he would drink a couple of ounces and then refuse to drink anything else for at least an hour. His refusals got so bad that he would scream when he saw a bottle of milk.
Obviously at the time I knew it wasn't right, but a mid wife told me it was colic and would go away after 10 wks (it didn't but got worse) and a doctor told me that it was a behavioural issue as my son didn't have a drinking problem at 5am!! That was probably because he was so hungry he didn't care...
Anyway, took him finally to another doctor who diagnosed Silent Reflux (where the stomach acid comes back up the oesophagus and causes them huge amounts of pain) and prescribed me some medication (Zantac) which changed my life! Although it took a full week for the effect to be fully seen, my son would drink his milk and not cry anymore...
I had tried teats, differnt milk, Dr Brown's bottles etc....but the only thing that made a difference was the medicine.
Even now though, my son is not a big milk drinker and although he is light for his age (at 10 months he was about 7kg), he is the most active, charming person I know.
My advice would be to please go to a doctor - I really wished I'd done it sooner to save my son the pain he went through those first few months!
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Hi Squiggles, is he still on Zantac or has the reflux resolved?
Cheers
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Hi firsttimemom,
Funny you should ask that - this weekend he has started to throw up his milk again but only if he is drinking a lot at once. He is ok otherwise (poo etc) and is fine on solids. I suspect it's his reflux but will probably have to take him back to the docs to check. He is also getting hiccups again more frquently which is a big sign of reflux (he ALWAYS used to have hiccups).
We had tried several times to get him off Zantac but each time he went off his milk and his hiccups would return....ho hum...
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bbvv
19 yrs ago
Hi Squiggles, my bubs only started to have this problem a month ago - before he used to be able to drink up his milk within half an hour.
Now he drinks up half with no problem then requires his burp and when we feed him again he screams when we put the bottle to his mouth or sometimes he hits the bottle away or turns his head to the sides. He needs like a 20min rest and almost asleep when he takes the rest of his milk at short intervals or sometimes none at all as he is asleep.
Maybe he does have a silent reflux - he does hiccup almost everyday. Just looked at a website that explains silent reflux and he does seems to have some of the symtoms listed. Will take baby to the doctors tomorrow morning to check it out. Hope this solves our problem. Thanks.
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bbvv
19 yrs ago
Went to the doctors this morning and he checked my baby all over and says that he does not have a silent reflux. He says it's more likely that a change in formula milk is required and suggested Enfagrow - has any of your babies tried this before and is it any good? At the moment he drinks a well known Japanese brand. My baby does not take in any water either as he doesn't like it and the doctor asked us to put in a little bit of glucose - isn't this supposed to be bad? He hasn't started teething yet.
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Hi bbvv,
I don't know who your doctor is but he cannot tell that your baby has silent reflux just by looking at the baby and checking him over. If he could then it would be alot easier to diagnose. The first doctor I took him to said my son had a behavioural problem, and even the midwife thought it was colic.
The doctor who diagnosed my son said that to determine silent reflux precisely would mean a lot of invasive tests (and I know children who have had the tests and they are not nice) but he prescribed me the medicine anyway as a) it was harmless so if my son didn't have the problem there would not be an effect and b) if my son had it then we would see an improvement without having to do the tests.
As it is, we had an improvement. You could try changing formula and see but I would also check with a doctor who knows a bit about silent reflux - especially after my experience. The first doctor was in one of those mass market surgeries in Quality Health Care and the second doctor I went to (Dr Thondup) is well renowned as a very good paediatrician, and although expensive, it was worth the money!
FYI, I tried changing milk too - had Aptamil (UK), Aptamil (NZ), Enfamil AR, Cow & Gate, Enfagrow, and finally O-Lac. My son would only drink O'Lac in the end but maybe because he would associate the other milk with his reflux.
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bbvv
19 yrs ago
Hi Squiggles,
The doctor said that babies who has silent reflux will throw up a lot and always feel more comfortable being upright than lying down. Ours hardly throws up and he sleep well on his back without frequent wakings. These couple of days, it has taken my son to drink up his milk in half an hour - he still needs a burp and a rest in between and it's easier to feed him when he is dozing off - not sure if this is good for his digestive system. I will be buying some Enfapro to see if this improves. Thanks for your advice. From what I hear I don't think I want to put my son through those testing unless really necessary. I'll give it a week and see how it goes.
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If you baby is well and thriving and his weight is 2.5 to 3 times his birthweight he is completely normal and you do not need to worry about his milk intake. He is giving you definite cues he does not want or need any more milk.Respect his cues. His rate of growth has now slowed and will be much slower during the second half of the first year, which is normal, resulting in less milk intake and less feeds. When solids are introduced at 6 months milk intake often decreases to 3 feeds (600 to 700 ml or 21 to 24 fl oz) plus 3 meals of solids.
Matilda International Hospital
Well Baby Clinic 2849 1500
Hong Kong
http://www.matilda.org
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bbvv
see how it goes. fyi, my son never threw up to start with (which is why it is called silent) whereas proper reflux is the throwing up obvious one.
that's why it was hard with me too as you couldn't see it, he wasn't fussed about being upright or on his back, and he slept from 7pm til 6am from wk 11...
but like the matilda said, he may not be a big drinker. my son has NEVER drunk more than 30ozs on ANY day and now at 14 months he will probably drink 14oz tops. at his best (before solids) it would be 24/25oz but those were rare.
saying that, he crawled at 7months and walked at 10.5 months so don't stress yourself out too much about it. see how it goes.
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