3 month old Crying When Feeding

Steadly

My 3 month old has started crying when being fed. She is being bottle fed and is on the 3 month old teats so I don't think flow etc is an issue. This happened a few weeks ago and passed but is back again. She cries until the bottle is mostly finished and then goes back to her normal happy self as soon as the feed is over. Winding doesn't seem to be the issue as I've tried winding her mid bottle or at the end and it makes no difference. Could she be starting to teeth and have sensitive gums? If so, should I give her a small dose of Calpol before a feed to see if this eases things for her. She hasn't had any Calpol to date. Any advice would be greatly appreciated as she's my first baby!

upinthesky

do you heat the bottles? maybe there a little too warm?

Steadly

No, they're room temperature.

Redr

She might have thrush. Check the inside of her mouth to for white patches. It can happen with bottle-fed babies and dummy users - it happened with my son. And the nurse didn't see it at the time (12 years ago). I forget the cure though.

PS - Don't feel guilty about using Calpol - it's a life saver. Neurofen is terrific too. It's tough being small and you don't want your little scrap in pain.

Redr

Redr wrote: »

She might have thrush. Check the inside of her mouth to for white patches. It can happen with bottle-fed babies and dummy users - it happened with my son. And the nurse didn't see it at the time (12 years ago). I forget the cure though.

It happened more back when people used Milton and the likes and the milton was killing the bacteria in the mouth thereby causing thrush. Generally you wouldn't get thrush from using steam sterilised bottles. However she could have thrush from something else.

It could be teething but I've (personally) never come across that before. Are you sure the flow of the teeths is sufficient? she may be struggling, I found with mine that they needed faster flowing teeths early on, I had them on 3 months + from a few weeks old.

It could be a number of things but I would talk to your PHN about it. I would be reluctant to use calpol before each feed, you could be masking a problem instead of sorting it

Nevyn

Pain is our bodies way of telling use something is wrong, and we shouldn't dope up ourselves and not our child and esp not an infant who can't explain to use what is wrong.

There could be a whole range of reasons why this is happening from something very minor to a serious medical condition.

I would suggest feeding her 20 misn earlier it could be she has hunger pains, but please mention it to your dr or the Public health nurse, don't ignore it.

Steadly

I will ring my PHN tomorrow and see what they say. I would be hesitant about using calpol etc for the very reasons you mention anyway. Thanks for all the advice!

wmpdd3

Does she have a white coating on her tongue?

Sorry this is covered above, thrush.

The Rook

While I would of course recommend contacting your PNH, your child could just have a sore throat. Is he/she sniffly or coughing at all?

As a tester I would recommend maybe giving your child Calpol about 20 minutes before a feed and seeing how he/she reacts after that (when the Calpol kicks in).

I'd also check to see if they can fit you in for a 3 month developmental check (I've heard you can be waiting 6 months for this!) so you can get everything properly checked out.

Just my 2c !

Ayla

Another idea, which I've recently learned, is that it may help to contact a cranial-osteopath. This has been discussed recently in some other boards forums, and it may be worth a look into (esp if the birth was quick/difficult/etc)

Sometimes sucking/feeding can cause discomfort due to relatively minor misalignments in the skull/neck. Or maybe it's the position the babe's held in during the feed?

Anyway, just another suggestion, but I 2nd the recs to ask your PHN or GP.