3 months and not eating?

[linsysunshine]

My 3 month old daughter has been refusing to eat and I think it's due to gas or constipation (she seems kicky, straight legs). She's in a relatively good mood during her A time although a little fussier than usual (very particular about what she does. If she's not sitting or being held "just so" she screams). However when I bring her in to eat she starts to scream and kick even though she hasn't eaten for 3 hours. It's only when she's tired and half asleep that I can get her to finally eat. I know this is not something I want to be encouraging but... the girl's got to eat!

My questions:

Why is she doing this?
How do I dodge accidental parenting?
How do I maintain a proper schedule under these circumstances?
Could it be that she's ready to move to a 4 hour schedule, that she's just not hungry at the 3 hour mark?

Your thoughts would be much appreciated.

[runningwildly]

I literally JUST posted a reply to another thread because I had this same issue just weeks ago. I'll share what I wrote.

My LO just went through a 3 week nursing strike and it was beyond frustrating. She was screaming and I was crying.
In my LO's case, she was telling me she wanted to drop a feed and needed more A time. I don't know if that's what is happening in your case, but I found she just didn't want to eat as much. I went from 6 to 5 feeds during the day. So after I dropped the feed, she would still periodically fight me....almost like she had memory and wanted round two just for the heck of it. Basically, she wouldn't eat unless she was calm. Do you find that is what you experience? Does your LO find the tub calming? I took her into the bath with warm water and she NEVER refused to eat. She'd drain both sides. It was very calming for both of us. I'd sometimes have to nurse her in there 3 times a day.....which gradually turned less and less. We're good now, but it took some coaxing.

Have you tried bumping her to a 3.5 hour routine? That would put feeds around 7am, 10:30, 2:00, 5:30...she'll stay awake until 7:00 where she gets a last feed and then bed for the night. I got that suggestion from the BW easy forum.

Best of luck. I hope this helps.

[~ Vik ~]

I'm wondering about reflux.  Some of the symptoms you're describing sound very similar to reflux babies - needing to be held just so, refusing to feed unless half asleep, refusing to feed even though she *should* be hungry...  Check out http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=654.0 and see if any of the symptoms ring true.

At 3mo it's unlikely that she's ready for a 4hr feeding routine.  Ebf babies typically go to 4hr routines later than formula fed babies due to the composition and digestibility of breastmilk.  For example, my ds was on a 3.5 hour routine from about 4mo until 5.5mo!  As pp suggested, you could try extending feeds to see if that helps (go very slowly though, about 5-10m every few days), but if she's refluxing you won't see any improvement.

Let us know what you think