Low weight gain, 16 week old

We were already in hospital but the paed and the dietician added duocal to the NG milk my girl was topped up on
I would also ask for a xray to make sure all his organs are working well

Best of luck hun

well i just got back from the doctor. the doctor said Oliver is failing to thrive and said that i need to supplement every feed with formula but since he can't have the normal formula cos it makes him get bad excema he is organising a thing to get subsidised neocate and is calling the nutricia people for a sample can of neocate in the mean time until the subsidy form comes through.

he said oliver will need weighed again 3 weeks after starting neocate and if he still isn't putting on weight then we will be referred to a pead.

flissty - nah i don't think he has reflux. He may have colic tho cos he pretty much screams for 2 - 3 hours in the late afternoon/ early evening

I don't mind about adding the formula, we were giving him 1 bottle a day about a month ago, it worked great at calming him down for the afternoons but gave him bad excema so we stopped it after about 4 days when we realised what we had changed.

my DD was fed EBM until 6 weeks and then was full time formula so if i can still feed him as well as give the formula, and if that makes him grow better i have no problems with it at all.

i tried having complan and tigers milk but that made the excema worse too

Yes, I have so been here. DD had as always had slo weight gain.   She is below the 3 rd percentile. I self referred to the Paed to check her put (bugged Dr till she gave in). Get your bub check for piece of mind.

I had low milk supply which I suspect was a result of PND. The paed sussed this straight away and yes disagnosed the horrid sounding failure to thrive. I had lost a huge amount of weight and was struggling with milk. He suggested working on milk supply and changing her to formula. I didn't have luck with formula as DD hates bottles.

Things have improved slowly. Firstly I sorted out sleep issues and my depression lifted. I take brewers yeast and milk thistle tablets, so have seen a marked improvement in BF. Go get friendly with your local health store.

If I do get low, we top up with formula in a sippy cup but I offer BF first. As I have an older baby, can give her lots of protein etc in solids, avocado, butter and meat are diet staples here.. I think there's a slow gain weight happening as DD has gone up a clothes size in the last few weeks.   I have put weight on too. Plus she has developed some more rolls.

The hardest thing is not stress, it makes it worse. But I have found that hard not to do. If your bub is happy, and sleeping well its usuallly a good sign. Even the paed agrees, but can't explain her growth as she shows no signs of a medicial problem.

We go to Plunket once a month for monitoring too.

Someone has to be at the end of the chart, and it might just be our kids are those kids. DD is a very happy baby and developing on cue or before her milestones and she's now a great sleeper. But she is little, I do everything I can but I also know that not everyone is going to be a super chubb. Good luck. Please let us know how you get on.

MMM

yeah, we had a dip from 16th percentile after birth. Do you do dream feeds? That might help waking. DD never really slept through the night consistently till 8 months, so i was happy if she only woke twice.

What ever the outcome there's help out there.

Hi there,

I really feel for you. We are going through a similar thing at the moment with my nearly 5 month old son. He only gained 300g in 6 weeks. We too were suggested formula top ups, but he hated it. I didn't even get him to suck on the bottle, let alone drink a whole one.

I took myself off to the GP who checked him over and said he looked healthy. I am now taking Domperidone and breastfeeding tea for my supply as we think mine was supply related because the nappies were slowly getting lighter.

2 weeks on and his nappies are wetter again, but I am not sure on weight as we aren't due a weigh until next week.

I agree with a previous poster who said that Drs are very quick to offer formula as a solution, when really, they may be no problem. My daughter was also slow to gain weight so I put her on solids at 4 months (on the health nurses recommendation) and topped up with formula and she STILL didn't gain weight. Took her to a paed who said health nurses need to stop relying on their books so much. He said my daughter was fine and just a slow gainer.

Good luck, as I said, I feel for you because it can be a worrying time.

I hope things pick up for you soon.

L

Jake was a slow gainer.. not that slow but slow none the less (more so big gains then big losses) and "failure to thrive" was thrown about by my GP and Plunket and forumula top ups were suggested.

I have health insurance so went and saw a paed privately and he had a good look at him and said he was fine!

He was just a small baby... and still is. Plunket had me doing all sorts to up my supply but he is just a little eater... he is only now just starting to eat "normal" amounts of food and I put that down to him now walking.

I personally would see a paed as they are the specialists and deal with this on a regular basis... but thats just me

The extra calories in the formulas - such as the one oliver would be put on - are a bit more than avocado kind of calories

My girl was tiny too 5kg at 6 mnths 8 kg at 1 - so I kinda have an idea of how it is too

My little girl was really sick - she still gained weight on calorific formula - its still better to rule out a hidden issue