Will the grunting ever stop?

erin_857 · February 2011

DS is 3 weeks old and he grunts All. The. Time. It seems like a lot of the time he's pushing to get someting out, and he sounds like he's in so much pain. I thought I read somewhere that eventually they get better at using their digestive muscles and it's not such a struggle for them to get gas/poop out. Anyone else ever heard this?

Marielle0430 · February 2011

Yes my DS is 7 weeks old and still does this although it's a little less than before. I would think if your DS is in pain he'd cry or at least cry out. Is he doing this? My DS doesn't cry out or cry while grunting. Sometimes he does it at night and he just continues sleeping. Is he having normal dirty diapers?

erin_857 · February 2011

No he usually doesn't cry unless he's been grunting for a while and we don't pick him up. He has a good amount of dirty diapers and they all are the normal yellow of BM poop. He does turn bright red though and has a ton of gas. Must just be a normal newborn thing!

jboyce77 · February 2011

Does he do other things like arch his back especially during feedings? Or cough/sound like he's choking when feeding or is extra fussy when laying flat with difficulty sleeping? My 4 week old daughter was doing the same things, along with horrible grunting, and VERY smelly gas and I too thought it may have been just that her digestive muscles were immature. We tried gas drops and gripe water without results. Then I called her pedi. It turns out she has reflux. I couldn't BF and was already using Enfamil GentleEase, but we had to switch to Enfamil Nutramigen and the MD had her start Axid (it's a Zantac type med). She was diagnosed last week, at 3 weeks and the MD said it could take 2-3 weeks to see big results. For her the gas and yucky poops have gotten better, but still grunts a lot due to pain with feeding. We also bought this inclined sleeper by Fisher Price so she doesn't lay flat at night. If your LO seems to be having some of these other symptoms, I would suggest calling your pedi. Hope this helps and good luck!

maruuruguay · February 2011

My baby does the exact same thing! After reading this, i started to realize every baby does it apparently. My son is 6 weeks old and doing it a little less now during the night, and still does it a lot during the day. I HOPE IT STOPS SOON