If your baby had bad reflux

[persa]

Did you ever pinpoint a cause? What helped it get better?

Both my boys(11 weeks), Baby B more than Baby A, have nasty reflux and it's gotten worse over the last few weeks. It just pours and sometimes shoots out of them, sometimes out of Baby B's nose. That said, they don't seem that uncomfortable and their weight gain at their 2 month visit was fine, though it's gotten worse since that visit.

I wish I knew what's causing it. I'm BF and also FF. We were initially using Earth's Best then started using Holle formula, which is an organic formula from Germany. Now we just started back on the Earth's Best low lactose. I don't limit my diet but I only have at most 2 cups of coffee the whole day and I eat dairy but not more that usual lately.

Any words of wisdom or thoughts would be appreciated.

[redheadk]

Dd had Severe Infant GERD. It is caused by an immature sphincter muscle between the stomach and esophagus. She was not MSPI, which can be another cause, just straight GERD. By 7-8 months, the muscle was stronger and she was able to come off meds.

Zantac didn't do much for her but Prevacid worked very well. She was on a high dose due to the severity of her GERD. The reflux caused significant pain and I was very concerned about damage to her esophagus given the amount of pain she was in.

ETA: She did not seem very sensitive to changes in my diet. Also, she was breastfed while we were figuring all this out but I did have to start pumping and bottle feeding daytime feedings so that I could add formula powder to my milk to increase the calories per ounce when she stopped gaining weight due to complications from reflux. She was fine with enfamil gentlease.

[humpforfree]

Mine was never diagnosed with actually reflux (though I think he might have had silent reflux for awhile due to the noises he was making) but he was a huge HUGE spitter. At 6 months I dropped all caffeine and it went almost completely away. I was only drinking 2 cups of half caff a day, so it wasn't a ton either. It did take 4 weeks to clear out of us, but it worked. Once or twice I tried to re-introduce and he spit like crazy almost right away. Now, at a year, nursing 2x/day, I am back to my half caff with no spitting up.

[water*drop]

DD had a milk/soy protein intolerance (MSPI) with reflux as her main symptom. Her weight gain was fine, but reflux was clearly causing her a lot of pain. She nursed to soothe the pain, which caused more pain, which caused more nursing, which caused more pain, etc, so her weight gain was actually pretty high until all of the dairy/soy cleared her system and her esophagus recovered.

[imimahoney]

My son was MSPI and had reflux. After I weaned he was one nutramigen and high doses of zantac. His mood certainly improved but he was a poker until 8ish months. Slowly it just got better but it was so so gross.

[ilikedonuts]

I always just ditto redheadk on this posts because my DD1's experience is very similar to her daughter's.

I FF though and we were also dealing with a milk protein allergy (along with the severe GERD and failure to thrive diagnosis) so she was on alimentum formula.

We weren't able to stop meds until 18 months. Even with meds, my kid still projectile puked multiple times a day and spit up a lot of the day, but she wasn't in pain anymore thankfully.

[mrssandro]

I am in the process of learning all I can about it.

I am currently reading this: www.amazon.com/dp/B000SEGEEE/ref=pe_385040_118058080_TE_M1T1DP
And watching youtube videos to see if I can learn something there.

DD is only 10.2# ounces but had a rough start. I suspected silent reflux because she doesn't puke every time. But she does arch her back and really fussy after every feeding. We where sent in to be evaluated to make sure it wasn't a feeding issue. They are referring us to a GI because she seems in obvious pain about 10 mins after eating. But they had to first send that report to the pedi and they had not yet. The pedi already gave us a prescription to zantac and today after 4 days of trying it she seems slightly better.

From what I understand make sure you tell your pedi that you suspect reflux and don't let them think you are crazy. Twins are notorious for having reflux from what I understand.

[demandypants]

I am treating our baby b for reflux. He too was spitting up lots, out of his nose, and in pain. The low dose of meds has helped a ton

[lilac05]

Mine were both "happy spitters." Massive spit-up to the point of me not wanting others to hold them because I knew the odds of my friend/relative getting covered in baby spit-up were outrageously high. It didn't matter when they had eaten, how they were held, etc. Nothing was safe.

I nearly drove myself crazy with DS1 trying to figure out what aggravated it and how to stop it. I never figured it out, and I tried almost everything. I didn't try much with DS2, I just accepted my fate of coordinating bibs with outfits, carrying around multiple cloth diaper burp rags, carrying Shout wipes in the diaper bag, etc. It was annoying, but at least I wasn't going out of my mind trying to figure it all out! They weren't bothered by it & gained weight as expected, it was just messy. (When I went through newborn clothes, I found myself attached more to the bibs than the actual clothes!)

It started getting better between 6 & 8 months. By 11 months, I had ditched the bibs (though I always had several extra outfits handy.