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Oregon Babies
Baby Gas?
My son is 3 weeks old and being breast and formula fed. He has such painful gas all day long (and I literally mean ALL DAY). He grunts and groans and pushes so hard he gets red in the face. I have called the advice nurse but she assures me this is totally normal. I don't feel like passing gas/stool should be painful and cause him to scream out in pain. Should I be concerned? Anybody have advice for relieving his gas. We have tried mylacon and it didn't do anything. Oh, and he has not pooped in two days.
Thank you
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Re: Baby Gas?
Our DS had the worst gas issues when we first brought him home. The first few weeks we barely slept because he grunted and groaned all night, it was awful, we felt so terrible. He wouldn't breastfeed because of his prematurity he liked bottles because that's what he had in the NICU. I pumped and fortified the milk with formula. We tried switching the brand we fortified with, this helped a little, we switched bottle types... this also helped a little, we put mylicon in his bottles rather giving it to him before or after this also helped a little, and burping the gas out as much as possible, and resting our hands (warmth) on his belly helped relieve the gas pain. Ultimately it's something they grow out of. But all of these little things each helped a bit.
The thing we found helped the most was our bottle choice we picked the playtex drop ins so we could squeeze all the air out, so he sucked less air. And we switched from Similac to Enfamil (I've heard other people had good results the opposite way as well) and they also make a gentler formula I think it's by Goodstart. Boys have this issue more than girls, they tend to have less mature digestive systems, at least thats what the nurses told me. Hope it gets better soon, I hated DS's gas problems, I felt horrible that there was so little we could do!
DD struggled with gas and bowel movements. It's normal - as in extremely common - for newborns to cry and scream, as heart-wrenching as it is. When you think about it, the sensations and movements are entirely new, and understandably uncomfortable and surprising.
DD often kept us up all night fussing over her gas. It seemed to really improve at 4-5 weeks, although she stills has moments. We found that completely burping her was crucial to prevent gas, which can take multiple trials. We put her to sleep in her carseat a couple of times when it was bad, which seemed to help. For DD, laying her on her left side is the best treatment for passing gas. When she struggles with pooing, sometimes feeding, sucking on her pacifier, and going diaper free helps. We started cheering her on when all else fails - it at least takes away some of the pain of listening to her struggle.
I'm not surprised the drops didn't seem to work; that's consistent with what I've read. We never tried them. But some people swear by them, so you can always try again.
ETA: Also, I've foung that DD takes in waaaay less air when she is BFed in the side-laying position.