Dear all:

As I was looking through all the indicators we have for judging whether or not a baby is 
ingesting enough, it became very clear to me that there can be an overreliance on one 
indicator over another.  As was pointed out, a baby who stools twice may weigh less than 
the baby who has stooled once.  If you are looking at the whole picture rather than one 
indicator you can and should take the indicator of stools into account.  Or, as I wrote 
recently, I often have several slow gainers who gain at the same rate, but by other signals 
you can distinguish between the healthy slow gainer and the unhealthy slow gainer, but 
requires looking at the total picture.  It matters very much whether that large baby is 
vigorously feeding with regular swallows, skin in good condition, begin offered the breast 
frequently versus sucking with infrequent swallows, yellow skin, offered the breast on some 
sort of regimented time frame, etc.  I have seen my share of marvelous guzzlers and a 
small number of sleepy huge babies who don't kick into gear with their feedings until they 
are a month old.  I suspect some sort of low level insulin problem with these really snoozy 
large babies.  It is readily apparent from how they feed that they are having difficulty. 

So, I always gather as much info as possible beyond just the weight.  

Best, Susan

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