Dear friends,

I need your input in the following situation (I have permission to share
from the mother).

I was helping mother with baby boy who was 1 month old at that time with
latch and weight gain issues.

Latch was painful from the beginning and baby lost more than 10% in first
days. He was slightly above the birthweight at one month. Mother had thrush
on her nipples. She used Bifidobacterium powder on the nipples to control it
(her own idea). Baby was alert and had good muscle tone. 

Mother worked from the very first days, she took the baby with her. The baby
was with his grandmother between feedings and cried constantly. Main concern
when I was contacted was that he cried frantically when he wasn't at the
breast. There was about 7 feedings a day. Really strong personality that
little boy is.

I give her suggestions for thrush and shared Dr. Newman's handouts with her.
We tried different positions, nursing in the sling and I encouraged mom to
wear the baby and nurse while she works with her laptop and whenever
possible. All family was much happier and both mother and grandmother noted
the difference in baby behaviour when he was allowed to stay close to his
mother.

 

The baby started gaining up to 50 g /day. He wanted to be at the breast
constantly. Sadly, mother had to work in office the next week (cannot take
baby with her all the time) and she wasn't able to express enough  for him
(she expresses every 3.5-4 hours with Medela MiniElectric, says she is not
able to express more often, gets 100-150 ml from 2 pumpings).

 So they gave him some formula. He seemed very hungry still. He was able to
eat 60-160 g of formula after breastfeeding and 180 g when he was with his
grandma at 6 weeks (she limits him - says that he is willing to eat even
more). Mother used fenugreek from the 4th week and domperidone after 5 weeks
(however, used low dosage 10 -20 mg day and irregularly when I spoke to
her).

Baby has great appetite and began to gain weight at frightening speed: 500 g
first week with supplementation and this last week mother wrote to me that
he gained 1 kg in the 7 days. I already shared with them Dee Kassing method,
encouraged grandmother to feed him very slowly and with breaks. Do not sure
if grandmother follows this advice, through.

 

I want to ask your collective wisdom whether this great appetite is the sign
of some endocrine problems or this can be just overfeeding when this strong
and really determined baby signals that he want his mom. What can be done to
correct the situation? It doesn't look like a catch-up growth anymore.

Should mother check her thyroid levels as pumping and frequent feeding when
she is at home seem not raise her supply? She had history of enlarged
thyroid some time ago. Or, thyroid problems are not the culprit if there was
a time when baby gained well on her milk alone? Can it be that her supply
was downregulated in the first month because of ineffective feeding?


Sincerely yours, Victoria Nesterova
bf supporter, Kiev, Ukraine

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