What is she doing?

[JennŠ]

My lo is 16 wks, 11 wks adjusted.  Lately she fusses to be fed, then when offered the bottle, continues to cry and pushes it away.  She keeps this up for various lengths of time, then accepts the bottle and acts like nothing was ever wrong.  She sometimes repeats this after burping.  This does not happen with every feeding.   It sounds like her hungry cry, not her I'm uncomfortable  cry.  She is being treated for reflux, but she is a happy spitter these days.  Spit up all over me and then gave me a huge smile.  She tolerates her formula (her 3rd) just fine.  Any ideas?  Thanks!!

[Johno & Aurelias Mum]

Could be she's really hungry and just wants to tell you that!  If its a hungry cry, just persevere or try and feed a little quicker once she starts crying.  I know that's hard when you have to warm the bottle etc etc but often they work themselves into a bit of a state when they know whats coming but it doesn't immediately happen.

[Tammy: Ethan & Kaden's Mom]

My ds would do this when I still had him on the stage 1 nipples.  He would eat for a couple of minutes, then start crying, and nothing I could do would get him to eat the rest.  I finally trying switching him to stage 2 nipples, and voila!  No more crying.  I finally figured out he was telling me it was too much work to suck through that tiny stage 1 nipple!   

Just a thought...

[PaulaP]

My Lo was doing the exact same thing.  I too changed the size of the teat on the bottle to the size three, and everything was ok.  He was working to hard to try and get his milk from the smaller teat.

After a few weeks of changing the size of the teat he started doing this again, and from there I changed him from feeding every three hours to the 4 hour easy routine.

Hope this helps - let us know how you get on.

Regards
Paula - Mum to Thomas - 14 weeks

[JennŠ]

We did just switch to the stage 2 nipples.  She uses simply thick to change her formula to nectar consistancy to help the reflux.  It seems to flow just fine through the nipple.  When she is not having a tantrum about eating, she does fine.  Does beautifully when dream fed.  Maybe she is just extra hungry.

[Mom to M&M]

Same problem... Marisa (9.5 weeks) has had cereal in her bottle for the past week and a half for her reflux. It is helping a lot but she's starting "fighting" with her bottle sometimes. She will usually eat the first half really nicely but then it's a struggle after that - she will start to refuse the bottle/chew at the nipple, gag, etc. But if she were to latch on, she'd usually hungrily eat more.

She's always been an aggressive eater with a strong suck. We did move her to the Dr. Brown Stage 2 nipples once she went on the cereal. The Stage 3 seem too fast - it was dribbling out her mouth.

Any thoughts? She used to love to eat and it doesn't seem that way anymore.

Does she not like the taste? Is it a nipple issue?

We are blending Beechnut rice cereal into Alimentum formula (1.25 tsp per ounce).

[Mom to M&M]

It's really odd. It's like she will eat the first batch before the burp very hungrily and suck very hard and move quickly. Then after the first burp it's sometimes a bit of a fight before she will take more and then after that she won't take any. So now she's drinking at most 4 ounces at a clip instead of 5-5.5 - and it's not a fun feeding anymore. Before the cereal she would eat 5.5-6 ounces 6 times a day (including overnight). Then she started drinking 5-5.5 ounces 5 times a day (she dropped a feed) when we started the cereal 1.5 weeks ago. Now yesterday and today she has only had about 4-5 ounces 5 times a day so she is getting a decent amount less formula.

She is also getting the hiccups with/after almost each one. Would this be a sign of a too slow nipple or a too fast one? So confused. She ate less than usual all day yesterday and woke earlier overnight - so she must be hungry... The strangest part is how she eats so hungrily/quickly but still nicely for the first part...

[Debi - James' Mama]

My ds was doing this too and i changed him to larger teats and it worked wonders!  He's never looked back since.

He does have his off days with feeding but I think sometimes they're just not that hungry.

When my lo went of his food (due to the teats not flowing fast enough) he still slept through and seemed quite content.  Try it out and let us know how it goes xoxo

[Mom to M&M]

I did try the larger nipples this morning but it was flowing out too fast. I'm going to switch back to the Avent bottles and nipples and see if that helps. Thx.

[Debi - James' Mama]

Hi Marissa's mom

I posted earlier about the larger teats.  What size were you using?  I use the Avent teats and bottles and when my ds was 11 weeks i was using no. 2 teats and then changed to no.3's at about 13 weeks.  He took some time to get used to them so try them again in a few days.

Let me know how you get on.

Hope all goes well

Debi oxox

[Mom to M&M]

Thx Debi. I will try the Avent #3 nipples at next feed. It's odd that the first few ounces go smoothly, but maybe it starts out flowing clearly but then the cereal starts to clog the nipple after a bit?

We had been using Dr. Brown's nipples. The Stage 2 seemed to work well flow wise with the cereal but she didn't like the nipples I think. She seems to like the Advent better but we need to play with flow. Hopefully the Advent #3 help - although I hope they don't start out too fast.

[Mom to M&M]

OK - the Avent #3 nipples are too fast. The #2s seem good at first but then get clogged. Although I really like the Avent bottles best, can't find the right flow. Meanwhile, the Dr. Brown's #2 nipples seem to work well flow wise but I don't think she likes the nipples. So maybe I will ty the Playtex Ventair ones - I've heard they can be good for reflux and thickened feeds...