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Tips to increase intake and weight gain of breastfed baby

My son, as you all know is underweight and breastfed. Like any concerned mother, I want to see him put on weight consistently. This led me to really look for ways to up his intake and make the best of what he will eat. These insights were priceless and difficult to find on the net – took a lot of careful observation and experimenting.

  1. The milk you feed him. Excess of foremilk and not enough hindmilk will cause gassiness. We know that – lactose overload or foremilk hindmilk imbalance. But why does getting enough hindmilk resolve this? Because hindmilk contains fats in addition to all that the regular stuff in the foremilk and the more the breast is empty, the more fats the milk will contain, making it travel slower through the intestines and get more time to be digested. So, if you have a good milk supply, pump off foremilk and then put the baby to breast. This way, what little quantity the baby drinks will have more calories in it, in addition to saving energy spent in gas pain, fussiness, etc.
  2. Feed at first cues of hunger. Okay, so we can’t always recognize them… Really, when in doubt, offer. When your baby starts following you with his eyes, offer. When baby has been awake for a while since previous feed, offer. If its hot weather and he could be thirsty…. Whatever. Offer. I was really surprised to see how much more than “every two hours” my baby would want to eat. If you catch the hunger before it reaches desperation and fussiness levels, your baby will be that much calmer and eat more.
  3. Don’t stop feeding when your baby takes a break. Often my son will stop drinking because he wants to burp or poop or pee. Getting that done will see him drinking again, if I offer, but he’s not hungry enough to fuss. (He will look at me constantly or stare at my breast though). After burping always offer to continue feeding if baby wants. If you miss this, he’ll just end up asking that much sooner, or god forbid, if you are a time table mom or don’t figure out he’s hungry, he’ll go partially hungry.
  4. Sometimes the baby plays with the nipple, rubs head against breast, arches back alternating with mouthing the nipple, cries, etc. He is NOT refusing milk. He is hungry, but is uncomfortable and can’t focus on it. Most of the time, burping will do the trick, or try calming him, waiting for a poop, helping him release gas. Whether it works to resolve the discomfort or not, sometimes you manage to help enough that he can now drink comfortably.
  5. Don’t soothe a hungry baby when you could feed him. Won’t work for long anyway, and aren’t you trying to increase his growth? Hunger is an opportunity. Even if it means he is eating all the time. If he is constantly asking to feed, obviously he is constantly feeling hungry. Don’t analyse it – “how could he be hungry again so fast?” etc – obviously he is. How doesn’t matter. Could be because he didn’t feed enough last time, or burped after that and now has more space or a growth spurt, or whim/weather…? Sometimes Nisarg will eat almost all the time, and when he settles again, his meals will have increased in size – a growth spurt in appetite?

These tips together probably doubled my son’s intake within a couple of weeks and kept the good doctor beaming in approval though his weight is still off the charts low.

Tips for infant gas pain

We had gas pain again last night.

This time around, I was able to comfort him in an hour…. which is too long for my baby to be in pain…

What worked was:

  • Playing his favourite music
  • Cuddling to comfort him
  • Breastfeeding to comfort him
  • Patting and stroking his back while cuddling to help him burp
  • Raising his legs like for a diaper change to help him fart
  • Doing leg exercises like cycling, pressing knees to stomach, etc

Feeling troubled about giving gripe water when the doctor said not to, I gave it anyway and discovered that burping him immediately after the gripe water provided greater relief than just giving it to him. He burped at least two times, maybe five (couldn’t be sure if those were burps).

Gas trouble for my baby

We had our first horrible night.

Nisarg just cried and cried and cried for 3 hours. We felt so helpless.

He woke up screaming bloody murder. Poor baby had gas. Every little while, a pain built and he screamed and squirmed and kicked out with his tiny feet in agony, and all we could do was look on helplessly as all our comfort methods failed. If there was ever a moment parents could be fired for failing their babies, it was this one….

I tried everything I could. Rocking, singing, talking, cuddling, massaging, feeding at the breast, bottle, moving his feet to help expel the gas. Everything worked for a minute or so, and the poor tyke was back to yelling. I have never felt so helpless or under prepared. The doctor had given us some drops and they helped, but it was about an hour after he had started crying that we thought to give them….

He had cried so hard that he was still having tiny sobs after he finally drank milk and slept. The morning brought some relief, but it was back to the same screaming inconsolably a while later.

Am at my wits end. Called the doctor, and she simply said that these things happen and to comfort him how we could.

Mother in law says to give him gripe water everyday, but the doctor shot down the idea earlier. She repeated it again, and again, and again, till we got some and gave it to him. Not much of a difference though he does like the taste.

On an internet expedition to find out what I can do to help him.

Milk coma in infants?

I learned a new term today – milk coma.

Apparently it is the state of the baby after it has fed well, and can barely keep his eyes open. Like this:

Talk about drunk
That’s it – not a drop more!

I used to call it Niarg getting tipsy on milk and then blackout, but “milk coma” describes it good too….

11 First breastfeeding tips

The first breastfeeding can be a stressful time for the new mother, particularly if its your first baby (as mine was). There is so much happening. You have barely registered that the painful labour is now over, you are excited about the baby, family is usually clustered close to see the baby and wish you well…. Well meaning relatives want to “help” you….

I was lucky to give birth at night so that I had time to rest before the visitors started flooding in. A friend delivered in the late afternoon, and the visitors were in her room before she returned from delivering.

All things considered, it is a rude shock to discover that babies don’t instantly feed absolutely “correctly” and the maternal instinct (if present after the ordeal – sets in later for some) doesn’t extend to knowledge about breastfeeding.

Here are some things you can do to make life easier for yourself and the newborn. Please note that these are based on personal experience and yours may vary:

  1. Kick everyone who doesn’t belong in the feeding plan out of the room. This is one lucky time in your life when no one will think you are anti-social for doing that. It could even extend to the husband if he is the type to hover over your shoulder anxiously. The only two people required are you and the baby – everyone else can go.
  2. Ensure that the room is warm enough for you and the baby or keep a blanket handy. The one on your bed will do fine.
  3. Strip from the waist up. I can’t stress this enough. Its “logical” that nothing except the breast needs bared, but my experience was that I didn’t need the fidgeting and fumbling with clothes in addition to the fidgeting and fumbling with baby that was inevitable.
  4. Take a moment to calm down. There is no wrong way to do this at this stage as long as milk enters mouth. Blessedly, the newborn doesn’t depend much on milk at this stage as it has glucose and fat reserves that get him well through the first day. Also blessedly, you will likely have a few drops of colostrum that can be expressed from your breast, so its not like you’ll be managing a fire hose. You can get those few drops into baby anyhow. So chill and enjoy!
  5. Calm baby, change diapers, etc. Get a warm, dry cuddly baby ready for a meal. Most people recommend that you strip the baby to diaper as well to ensure he stays awake. Others would recommend swaddling since that takes care of unpredictable limbs that could challenge your unproven “fielding” skills. My experience was that the baby was wide awake with no intentions of sleep at this feed. However, skin to skin feels good for both of you. Still, there is so much going on, and figuring out baby to nipple is going to be a big challenge, so fair enough if you want to take the limbs out of the dexterity equation. Whatever appeals to you.
  6. Bring baby to breast and get nipple into mouth. Do it however it works as long as baby’s neck is supported and you move entire baby (not just head) to fit mouth to nipple. Worry about posture later. This is about the time when a spare pair of hands would come handy. So if your husband (or boyfriend, friend, sister, relative…. if there is someone you’ve kept in the room to assist you) is the useful type, he could help get the nipple into the baby’s mouth when in range. Believe me, as excessively personal as it sounds, all the other stuff is best done by your hands.
  7. Baby will open immediately and suckle. That’s one thing that works as advertised. Correct latch and positioning and all is described all over the net, so I don’t repeat it here. Anyway, my experience was that it can’t be learnt from reading. What works is whatever gets milk into mouth, manages safety and doesn’t hurt me. The pillows for the baby to breast campout mission are unnecessary at this stage (for me). There isn’t enough milk for baby to be doing this enough for me to tire of holding this miracle to my breast. More so, it takes a whole load of fidgeting to get to a place where things work, which is impossible to predict and prepare pillows in place for and once you manage it, the last thing you want is to move to adjust pillows and risk having to start over. Don’t even think of pillows until your milk comes in. Something to lean against is plenty.
  8. Don’t worry if it doesn’t all go how its supposed to. I kept pressing on the nipple and when the milk beaded out, brought baby to it to lick it off. Baby used to latch on briefly. Lather, rinse, repeat. Slowly, you will automatically figure out how you can hold the baby so he stays on longer.
  9. Remember, you have stripped, so don’t worry about any drips of the sticky stuff. Just wipe off with wet towel when done.
  10. Express all the colostrum you can into baby’s mouth. For these first few days, the “feeding” of breastfeeding is more active than the “suckling”, since it takes some getting used to for both of you. This means that you are doing it all correctly even if you are expressing every drop the baby gets into his mouth. Eventuall practice and laziness will collaborate to get you there, as your milk increases and you try to get the baby to suckle more effectively, since you can already see that expressing will only go so far.
  11. Done. Cuddle baby and celebrate these first quiet hours before the poo and pee parade runs you over.