There are a few things you can count on with a newborn. They will definitely sleep. . .and wake. . .around the clock. They will soil through their diapers and their clothing at least once before they are 6 months old. And they spit up.
I tend to think that reflux is often over diagnosed. That’s not to minimize the experience of those parents whose infants have reflux. It’s a difficult experience because reflux babies are in so much pain that they are frequently crying, very clingy and generally smell sort of like. . .well. . .puke. It’s a rough start for mom in the beginning. But we do live in a world where we want a quick fix, and studies are starting to show that far too many infants have been prescribed medication for what could be considered normal spit up.
Someone in the forums asked about breastfeeding and reflux, and so I thought I’d take a blog to answer. Reflux in the breastfeeding world is less common. There are a few theories for this. The first is that a breastfed infant is rarely over fed. (Yep, that is to say that some babies spit up excessively because they are stuffed to the gills from bottle feeding.) The second idea is that because breastmilk is more easily digested, it’s just not sitting in their waiting to come back up.
My own personal thought is that of true reflux issues, it doesn’t matter how you have fed the baby. Breastfeeding or formula feeding doesn’t cause true reflux. Babies with reflux do tend to want to eat in smaller portions and may do better breastfeeding because they can control how much they’re getting. . .but that’s really more dependent on the individual baby and the severity of the reflux.
So does your baby have reflux? Two tell tale signs are spit up coupled with pain/screaming, and weight loss. Make sure to check out my next blog on how to manage breastfeeding with a reflux baby.
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