in pain, screams & unsettled 8 week old

[gill75]

Hi all, I apologise in advance for the long post, but I'm lost and I'm hoping that someone has or has had a similar experience. My little man is 8 weeks old and from day 1 he screamed with tears every night. Very hard to handle when I don't know how to help him. He went from BF to S26 in week 2. Then he became constipated and got worse. Everyone suggested colic so we tried 'Formula GIT' drops, which made gurgling noises in his guts, but no difference for the pain. We started 20ml warm water & 1 teaspoon brown sugar for his constipation. We visited a pead at 4 weeks whom suggesting changing formula to Nan pro gold for constipation issues. He went 5 days without a poo, then a nice runny one. Then continuted to poo nicely every 3 days. We then commenced him on coloxyl drops and poos continuted to be every 2-3 days and soft in texture. The screaming at night continued and he was in so much pain, crunching up and crying. All this time he was putting on a little weight, but not as much as she had hoped, and he also wasn't drinking what he should have been, as he doesn't get to drink much from arvo to night as he is just screaming in pain. At 7 weeks of age, pead put him onto a prescription formula 'neocate' which she said will help the colic, but will also help him thrive due to his weight. She said he may also have a protein intolerance? She said he should be drinking 650ml formula daily, but is averaging 400-450ml/day, with the best days being 510ml. Now at 8 weeks of age, after being on this special formula, we went back to pead and he hasn't put on any weight at all. Still weighs 4.7kgs. (Birth weight was 3.91kg)She was very disturbed by this and now wants to weigh him again tomorrow morning, but is talking about admitting him to hospital to feed him via tubes & supplements in his formula to make him put on weight. The screaming at night has settled down, but he is still unsettled and in some pain still. Now today is day 5 without doing a poo. It's like we sort out one thing, and another thing gets worse or appears? Any suggestions?? Thank you for reading.

[lizied]

Hi. We had a similar experience with our little man. he was about 8-10 weeks at the time. He would start to eat most of the bottle in the morning around 100-150ml than by afternoon was only drinking about 60-80ml. He screamed all the time in pain. we took him to a baby chiropractor. They advised that his stomach was not mature enough and is not digesting the milk and it is just sitting in his stomach and this is causing all the pain. They suggested changing the milk he was on to goats milk as i had him on Karicare gold plus. He had a parasite in his stomach due to not digesting the milk. We gave him some acidophilus for about a month to help the parasite go away and We placed him on goats for the next feed after we left and by the second feed of goats milk we had a different child. We give him about 60ml of water with no brown sugar a day and he is pooing every second day and they are nice and soft. Hope this helps.

[lemmon4]

Just a thought, but if your bubs is not drinkin enough then he wont be pooing much either. I say this because my 3rd baby startd screaming at 6 weeks old after feeds then refused them completely resulting in being hospitalized with feeding tubes etc. After a week of this, pedeatricians decided to place a tiny camera probe into her stomach for 24 hours. Finally sucess, turned out my bubs had silent reflux (acid coming up and down the throat,causing burning ) no wonder shes screamed all the time!! Maybe it might be worth you getting your little guy checked for reflux! There is reflux where baby will projectile vomit every feed, then there is silent reflux where there is no vomiting at all. Hope you figure it out soon

[TR044D]

gill75, on 14 March 2010 - 04:38 AM, said:

Hi all, I apologise in advance for the long post, but I'm lost and I'm hoping that someone has or has had a similar experience. My little man is 8 weeks old and from day 1 he screamed with tears every night. Very hard to handle when I don't know how to help him. He went from BF to S26 in week 2. Then he became constipated and got worse. Everyone suggested colic so we tried 'Formula GIT' drops, which made gurgling noises in his guts, but no difference for the pain. We started 20ml warm water & 1 teaspoon brown sugar for his constipation. We visited a pead at 4 weeks whom suggesting changing formula to Nan pro gold for constipation issues. He went 5 days without a poo, then a nice runny one. Then continuted to poo nicely every 3 days. We then commenced him on coloxyl drops and poos continuted to be every 2-3 days and soft in texture. The screaming at night continued and he was in so much pain, crunching up and crying. All this time he was putting on a little weight, but not as much as she had hoped, and he also wasn't drinking what he should have been, as he doesn't get to drink much from arvo to night as he is just screaming in pain. At 7 weeks of age, pead put him onto a prescription formula 'neocate' which she said will help the colic, but will also help him thrive due to his weight. She said he may also have a protein intolerance? She said he should be drinking 650ml formula daily, but is averaging 400-450ml/day, with the best days being 510ml. Now at 8 weeks of age, after being on this special formula, we went back to pead and he hasn't put on any weight at all. Still weighs 4.7kgs. (Birth weight was 3.91kg)She was very disturbed by this and now wants to weigh him again tomorrow morning, but is talking about admitting him to hospital to feed him via tubes & supplements in his formula to make him put on weight. The screaming at night has settled down, but he is still unsettled and in some pain still. Now today is day 5 without doing a poo. It's like we sort out one thing, and another thing gets worse or appears? Any suggestions?? Thank you for reading.

I went through all that nightmare

[TR044D]

TR044D, on 15 March 2010 - 09:43 AM, said:

I went through all that nightmare

I went through all that nightmare with my third child and he only drank 400ml of neocate as it was discusting. We finally saw a specialist and he was put on ACTILAX which is perfectly safe and stopped a lot of the constipation and pain in his tummy withing days he was drinking normal formula and over a litre a day for about three weeks to make up for what he missed. I also saw a really good chiropractor for him. Goodluck.

[lylstarsmummy]

I'd also recommend a chiropractor. You may not get an overnight miracle (but then again it has happened) but stick with it and you will reap the rewards of a happy baby. Being born is a traumatic process, no matter if it occurs naturally or through c-section and getting bub properly aligned again may work wonders.

[KellynDarcy]

Hey we've been through a similar problem with the not gaining weight protien allergy and tube feeding...

Couple of things firstly... Neocate will constipate them and you will need to give a daily laxitive we use ducolax, and just add a couple of drops a day, be careful if they tell u to use lactolose as it is on the same list as cows milk protien allergies...

The other thing is that the neocate does taste pretty crap and it does take a lil while for them to get use to it so dont expect them to be able to drink the same amount they were. Also if he's constipated its prolly why he's still in a bit of pain...

We've also been down the tube feeding road, with the lil man now having a feeding peg in his tummy instead of a nasal gastric tube, though this is because of other medical issues not related directly to the neocate. so if you've got any questions please just ask, when this kinda stuff gets dumped on you its very confusing and overwhelming etc.

I tend to "hangout" more in general then around here so please send me a PM if you've got questions, i'd be more then happy to try and help

[Belinda_Anasta]

Hi im sorry to here about your troubles

I have four month old identical triplets and we had problems with feeding and constipation. Our girls were born at 34 weeks old and had to be tube feed because they needed to learn how to suckle, i personally didnt like this experiance because it didnt look nice with the tube up their nose and when it came out it was horrible to watch them put it back in, althought tube feeding is very affective in putting on weight. I refused to take my girls home on tube, so before they came home they were weined onto bottles and there formular was nan pro gold, we were told this is the closest to breatmilk because it is packed with vits etc but this worked against us because there little bellies coulnt take this, it was too much on them, they became very constipated and where in horrible pain screaming after every feed.

We consulted a prac and he suggested to change their formular and to sit them up after there feeds, we changed to s26 newborn step one and this is really good the girls are putting on weight and rarly get un settled. I came accross an oral liquad called "infants friend" i think every mother should have this i dont know what i did with out it, with this my girls poo everyday and if they have a lil tummy ake i give them this an they are settled within mins.

Infants friend is all natural and can be bought at any chemist without precription. it will relieve colic, wind, restlessness ad irrations and imflamation of the gums, it keeps the bowls reg which is really good cause i found that if the girls were constipated they couldnt feed cause of the pain and wouldnt put weight on.. and infants friend will produce natural quiet sleep yay!
The girls love the taste and it can be given before or after a feed and if ness in between.

i really hope this helps let me know

[gill75]

Hi there. Thank you for your reply. You are one brave woman with 3 little girls. I hope you are doing well with it all. Your girls seem to be the complete opposite to my little man. My boy got constipated on the S26, and was doing well on Nan. And the Infants Friend didn't work for his colic either. He is now on Neocate formula and doing well. (Prescription formula prescribed by paediatrician). He is seeing an Occupational Therapist, Speech Therapist and Dietician on Monday in regards to his feeding etc. He did put on some weight this week with the extra formula and supplement, so that's great, but they still want to check his feeding and doing some blood/urine tests to rule other things out. So cross fingers and we'll see what comes of Monday. Thank you again for your response and best of luck with your beautiful 3 girls.

[Cheeky_Me]

We had the same thing with our DD, she screamed all night for the first month and we just put it down to being a newborn and us not knowing what we were doing. We ended up taking her to the doc and he said she was probably Lactose Intolerant! I was BF and it was so so hard for me to accept that was i was doing might not be the right thing for my little girl. I put her on LF formula and she settled down and was drinking whole feeds and pooing normaly everyday. I dont know if your little one is but it sounds like its worth a try. Good luck with your little one

[Cheeky_Me]

Oh and also "Infants Friend" such a miracle!! Just like Belinda_Anasta recommended.

[lotta]

hi,

i had my son 19th march 2010. from day one i had the same problems. i saw three peads and differnt doctors and no one caould tell me what was the problem.

My son wouldnt drink hardly anything. he screamed and always was scrunched like he had wind but i new he didnt.

I was told the same as you that he mite be allergfic to cows milk so tried pepti junior and neogate and still nothing changed.

by him being six weeks old i had enuff, i was stressed and had no idea on how to help. I finally took him to the hospital and got him admitted and told them i was not leaving untill i had answers.

after being there all nite, one of the head peads came down and after reading bubs history over last 6 weeks he diagnosed him with SILENT REFLUX...... i thort yeah rite it cant be that simple.

however i was prescribed baby losec in a liquid form and was giving him 2.5 mls a day and within 2 days the sreaming stoped, he started drinking properly and was the most content baby.

I would suggest you see a doctor and get them to look into it. If i hadnt have taken him to the hispital that nite i thuink i would still be in the same boat.

good luck i hope this helps. I do understand what you are going threw.

[Jkho]

Hi
I have the same problem with my little boy, he is 3 months now. He was on S26 and poo nicely. But we notice he was unsettled so much at nite by 4 weeks. Its like every 2 minutes he will crunch groan arch in pain.Holding his legs up towards his chest. He was so sleepy but couldnt really get much sleep. I thought this could be colic and went to GP and got suggestion to change to Novalac Colic. This works very well.The pain is decreasing gradually. He is more settled at nite and during day time no more pain. Oh btw he also use Infacol (wind drop) to help him burp or get out the wind since he was 2 weeks old until now.
But with Novalac he got constipation badly.
These days we try to give him more water. Not sure about putting brown sugar. But my little boy had once drink water that contains sweet sort of thing ( to help with his constipation, a suggestion from a friend), that really make him worse. He was unsettled whole nite. I remember my GP told me formula for colic is less lactose, lactose is kind of sugar sort of thing. For long term drinking colic formula baby might not have enough nutrition. So once the baby gets better should change to standard formula. I did changed to S26 when he was 8 weeks but he was unsettled whole day and nite. In pain. So I went back to Novalac Colic. Today he is 3 months he still has stomach uncomfy every morning around 6 am. But I am pretty sure it will get better when he grows up.