Dear all:

Mother has given me permission to post about her situation.  I saw her baby
at 3 days for latch on difficulty.  His birth weight was 9 pounds 5 ounces
and his discharge weight was 8 lb 12 ounces.  He started by only latching
onto the breast once or twice a day, and only after receiving about 2
ounces from finger feeding or a Haberman bottle.  It took about a week, but
he backed his way into breastfeeding by using smaller and smaller amounts
of expressed breast milk before offering the breast.  When I saw him at 14
days of age he was back up to 9 pounds 7.7 ounces.

The mother called me yesterday in a panic because the pediatrician had
given a hard time about her baby being overweight.  He's 21 pounds at 3-1/2
months old.  The mother was not clear on his current length.  The
pediatrician told her to start giving him water and to space out feedings
to a minimum of four hours between feedings.  She told her that her baby
would be developing too many fat cells and maybe the fat content of her
milk was too high.  The pediatrician claimed she had never heard of a
breasfed baby that had gained so much weight.

It seems ot me that before one messes with a baby's diet, one should find
out if anything is really wrong.  I want to help this poor mother aboid an
eating disorder where none existed before by putting this baby on a diet
without knowing whether or not this is the baby's natural rate of gain.
Fortunately, the feeding the baby water plan didn't work so the mother
abandoned that approach and has gone back to on cue feeding.

So, first all of you who have seen healthy breastfed babies that have grown
off the charts and then settled down into reasonable weights for their
lengths as they matured and became mobile would be helpful.  Second, I do
want to give her sound advice about any "zebras" that she might have the
pediatrician look into.  The baby did not seem to exhibit reflux type
behavior - he was generally very relaxed and mellow. If you have heard of
any odd conditions that may cause a baby to gain off the charts please let
me know.

I would like to know the length before concluding this baby is overweight,
but the mother was very unclear, she thought 22 inches, which having seen
this baby I'm sure that his length is far longer.


Thanks,

Susan Burger, PhD, MHS, IBCLC

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