Farty baby

[Murron]

Hi there,

My baby is excessively farty, which would only be embarrasing if it wasn't for the fact that it wakes him up and won't go back down making him really overtired and grumpy. He cries for an average of 3-4 hours per day and he'll fart well in excess of 100 times during the day-time and they are loud man sized farts and usually smell pretty bad. Interestingly, he normally sleeps OK at night (but this might be down to exhaustion) and his pumpy bum rarely wakes him. He does fart through the night but not normally so much until he's due to wake anyway.

He's 7 weeks old and I'm feeding him on Aptamil ( 6x 5oz feeds). I use the Dr Brown's bottles and stopped using the various colic reliefs as they made no difference.

He tested negative for lactose intolerance last week.

Any suggestions?

[andy-hughes]

He is probably feeding too quickly, and not winding correctly.

Feed him smaller amounts more often - this will stop him being so hungry that he wolfs his milk down with a mass of air. Take your time with him, let him feed as slowly and quietly as possible. Stop after every few mouthfuls and wind him - rub his back gently and pat it, both on your shoulder, and on his tummy on your lap.

When he;'s finished, don;t put him straight down, have some quiet time cuddling him, and wind him again.

A baby's digestive system is the last part of the body to form, and it is not fully developed at birth, and continues developing for the first few weeks, hence the problems babies have digesting their food properly.

If the problem persist, have a chat with your mid-wife, he may need a change of formula.

[The Tiggster]

If you can afford them, aparently the Habermann Feeder is very good at cutting down the amount of air that baby takes in, as it is the closest type of bottle to breast feeding, doesn't allow air into the feed & slows baby gulping down the milk. You will see from the link below that they are not the cheapest.

A friend tried the Haberman & put her baby on soya milk even though the tests for lactose intolerance came back negative. She had some good results within a few days, but it took a couple of weeks before they saw the real difference.

Habermanfeeder

Good luck.