Spitting up a LOT!!

My sixth child did this. None of his siblings wanted to hold him because of the spitting up. He had classic allergic hair: it stood straight up. He did much better when I eliminated dairy and wheat and corn. Most babies who do this have no problems gaining weight though. She actually regulates what she eats better at breast, as she is in charge, not the bottle nipple flow. She could be taking more than she needs at breast because she has sucking needs that aren't met at the bottle because it flows faster, so she needs to suck more at breast. Babies suck for comfort, and what better place than mom?

Hi S.,

Both of my babies now three years and 13months started spitting up around three m onths, then it subsided. I worried at first too but then the grew out of it. If she's not in pain or fussy don't worry yet.

C.

Oh, I feel your angst!! Your baby (and mine) are probably perfectly normal. What's important is if your baby happy and gaining weight? She's perfectly healthy then. Breastfeeding is so stressful, isn't it? I'm constantly worrying and wondering if my son is getting enough, then I weigh him and he's gained another ton.

My 10 week old son has been doing the exact same thing for about the last month. I call him the volcano, because he erupts so unpredictably. It's always when I breastfeed, never when I give him expressed milk in a bottle. I thought maybe he was nursing too quickly, but he sucks down a bottle like there's no tomorrow :-)

What is happening is that the sphincter that closes between her esophagus and stomach is still immature and doesn't close completely, so that the milk just comes back up. This is perfectly normal. What you are seeing, if it's still liquidy, is a mixture of milk, mucous, and saliva. It looks like a lot, but try spilling a teaspoon or tablespoon of water on the counter and that will look like a lot too.

It's happening at this age instead of from the start because she's now starting to take in larger quantities of milk, and also your breasts are starting to up their production (are your breasts squirting milk out? I can pump out an additional 5-8 oz immediately after nursing him - I have to because it hurts!). Also, regurgitated/partly digested milk (the curdled stuff) can also still "erupt" up later, again because that little sphincter hasn't developed yet to fully do its job.

Something to consider is if she in pain? Is the spit-up really projectile? Then you may want to consult with your pediatrician about reflux. If your baby is happy and gaining weight, then she's probably just fine.

My son usually smiles and laughs after spitting up; ok sometimes he gets cranky too but isn't in pain. I've changed so many clothes (his and mine) and burp clothes, it's crazy! He can spit up just as I'm raising him upright to burp; he can spit up during and after burping; as I'm turning him around to switch breasts; always when I'm changing his diaper; and 2 hours after a nap. Interestingly, he never spits up during tummy time. And of course, he spit up all over me the first time I wore nice "grown-up" clothes last week.

Yes, he could be overeating, but there's no way to really quantify how much he's eating at the breast unless you weigh him before and after nursing. From a bottle, my son takes in between 2.5 and 4.25 oz. Who knows what he's doing at the breast except from what I express afterwards.

I've gotten advice to feed him upright, to take him off every few minutes and burp him, and to feed him less but more often from my lactation support group. I, personally, am not into the feeding less and more often, because I want him to "learn" to take in more but less frequently so that he can sleep longer thru the night without getting hungry (we're up to 7 hours of sleep at night). Also, nursing every 2-2.5 hours is just crazy. Some may disagree with my methods, but at least we're all happy sleeping at night. My pediatrician has given the ok to let him sleep as long as he wants thru the night now.

I've found nursing him with his head slightly higher than his body helps. One mom in my support group nurses with her baby in the Baby Bjorn. If you are sitting, leaning back a little so that you're not hunched over your baby helps too. Also, burping him more frequently (sometimes I feel I'm burping him longer than actually nursing him). Also, trying to stay relaxed with a peaceful state of mind helps a little.

The moms and lactation consultatnts in my support group assures me it gets better. My pediatrician reassures me it gets better. My mom reassures me it gets better. My in-laws....well, my in-laws tell me my husband spit-up until he was four. I'm hoping our son doesn't take after him. Oy. That's a lot of laundry!

By all means she could be overeating and breastfeeding you would not notice how much she is taking in baby's do not know when to stop eating I found that out the hard way when my son was a baby until I had to feed him a jar of baby food in the middle of the night to satisfy his hunger so start timing her for a while see how long she feeds then reduce it by 5 min to see if that changes if not reduse a few more min till she is happyly full but not stuffed with the bottle you can tell what she took in you have to remember you increase in milk so it makes sense to know it is there so she increases to.

S.

My (now 8 year old) breastfed girl spit up all the time until she was 1. Running joke in our house... you pick her up without a burp cloth its your own fault. Between that and the blow-out breastmilk poops EVERYTHING was stained some shade of yellow. She wasn't in pain, grew fine, and is perfectly normal now.

S.,

I don't know if you have found the answer you needed yet or not; so let me suggest that you go the the website for the La Leche Leg. there are 5 answers to the spittimng up issue so sign in then go to the little maginifying glass upper right corner & then put in spitting up and that will return 5 or more findings on the subject, there is a whole bunch of them & I hope that you can find the one you need. here is the link http://www.llli.org/nb.html

I will keep you & your precious Angel in my prayer List

Merry Christmas

I.

First,I have a 7 1/2 year daughter old and a 15 1/2 year old son, so I have some experience. At 3 1/2 months old your baby shouldn't really be eating food. Try waiting till she's 6 months. But that's probably not what's causing the spitting up. My daughter had a spitting up problem from about 2 or 3 months till almost a year old. It was due to an immature reflux (very common, actually) We changed her bib about every 10 minutes (NOT kidding!!), and her clothes several times a day. If anyone held her we gave them a cloth diaper to throw over their shoulder. We just got used to it, because other than that she was a complete angel, just like yours, and before we knew it, it was over. (my son on the other hand had colic and it was a struggle to get him to nurse, which eventually he did happily for 4 years!) So ask your doctor if it could be that, and good luck!

hi

i have been breastfeeding bella since day one and she is 5 1/2 months. my gut on what you say here is that it might be the dairy you are eating. are you eating a lot of dairy? i havnt been eating any and bella never spits up. once, we had a situation where i needed to feed her an alternative - my boyfriend mixed up an organic formula for her with dairy....she vomited it all up.

i would check the dairy intake if you are eating that. and eat more greens and broccoli and such to make up for the lost calcium.

peace

jodi b

YES!! I DO KNOW THE ANSWER!

hi S., i SOOOOOO feel your pain. i have been there! my son (now 15 months) went through two months of PROJECTILE "spitting up" (we couldn't go anywhere without his "up-chuck-it bucket to catch it in!!!) and i tried everything--right down to the insane "elimination diet" recommended in order to figure out what your child may be reacting to (which meant all i could eat was PLAIN baked potatoes, pears, plain turkey, and a few other things--oy!). even working with my local la leche league i was getting nowhere.

UNTIL an angel appeared in the form of one brilliant woman who lives in canada and does online email advice for la leche league. when she heard me say my son had reflux (i had self-diagnosed based on all the symptoms i'd read in books), it sent up a red flag and she said, check this out: http://www.llli.org/FAQ/oversupply.html

YES!! that was it! you were right about the overeating at the breast! it took a while, working with "block feedings" where i would nurse my son on one breast for a certain number of hours no matter how many times he wanted to nurse during that time, then switch to the other breast for the next chunk of hours. we had to experiment to find out exactly how many hours of a block worked best, but soon he wasn't spitting up AT ALL and all of those tons of burp cloths and rags we'd had to purchased never really got used again. hallelujah!

so there is hope for you, S.! i know how hard it is. hope the oversupply thing works for you! it only makes sense, since all of the breastfeeding advice we get these days is how to bump UP our supply and make sure our babies are getting ENOUGH. all my best to you and your sweet angel! :o)

I had this problem with my son when he was around 2 or 3 months old. I took him to the doctor and he suggested that I don't burp him first of all. I know it may sound unhealthy but really hear me out. He told me to put him in his swing, car seast or bouncy seat ...just make sure she is sitting at the angle this seats provide and let him stay there for about 20 minutes or so. He eventually burped on his own and for the most part would not spit up anymore. The doctor told me that some babies need more time for their food to settle before burping them and for the most part if given the right comfort and angle and enough time they generally could do it on their own. It worked for mine but like they say all babies are different. I hope this helps!

And I will have to disagree about with others about your baby over eating. It is a proven and well known fact that babies at this age cannot over eat. It is definitely a learned habit but babies stop eating when they are full and of course start crying when they are hungry. My son ate and ate all the time and I promise it was not overeating or else he would be overweight by now. So please do worry about overfeeding your baby. Her body knows how many nutrients and how much milk or food she needs. I wish you the best of luck! =)

Hello my fellow mother-of-a-throw-up-queen. My daughter started "spitting up" (more like throwing up) at about a month and it was HORRIBLE until she was four and a half months old. And when I say spitting up a lot I mean WAY in excess of 30 or 40 times a day. I literally couldn't go anywhere. I went through six and seven outfits a day for her and I both because she would just soak us with her vomit. It was the worst time of my life in that respect. I took her to the doctor and they put her on Zantac, which apparently helps to reduce the amount of acid so its less harmful on her esophagus but doesn't diminish the number of spit ups in a day. She HATED it and it spit it out so it was useless anyway. NOW FOR THE GOOD NEWS! I found something that worked, we bought Gripe Water (USA baby, Baby Emporium, and I think Walgreens) and it was amazing. She went from spitting up 30 plus times a day to maybe five or six times a day. I gave her 1 teaspoon right when she woke up, 1 tsp right before her nap at 11:00 and then 1/2 tsp before bed, it virtually stopped the throwing up and I could finally enjoy my baby daughter instead of being on constant spit up control, others could finally hold her, I could lay her on the couch without towels and blankets and all around her. It was soo nice, so please try it. Its called Gripe Water and its 100% natural, homeopathic herbal water she takes through a syringe and my daughter liked the taste so it wasn't a battle getting her to take it. Let me know if it works for you!
I told the pediatrician about it and she told me to stop the Zantac and continue with the gripe water if its working! (which I already had done)

Sounds like overeating, or a strong let down. Try to stop her a few times when you feed her to burp make sure that all the burps are out. My son had reflux and the only way it got better was to burp him a lot. Also you need to relax she might be getting worked up because you are anticipating something going wrong. Here are some other things to think about. Does the spit up have curdles in it or is it just undigested milk? Does it happen at all times of the day or just a certain time. Because you could be eating something that your daughter cannot process. Dairy is a huge culprit, vegetables, caffeine, chocolate. Look at your diet, I think it takes 4 hours for what you are eating to show up in breast milk. Is your daughter uncomfortable before it happens, can you feel her tummy gurgling away before an episode? Keep a log for a day or two then call you pediatrician and say I have charted this and this is what I am seeing. Also call a lactation consultant or your local LLL, they may have some ideas too. Good luck, don't give up and if you have to pump for a while and give her bottles then do it. I had to with my twins then after about 3 weeks I was able to reintroduce breastfeeding and it has been fine since.

I have a 16 month old daughter who I exclusively breastfed (no bottle no pacifier). I do remember that she (Milissa) went through that extreme spit-up, throw-up phase when she was about 3 months. I had to monitor her all through the night because I was afraid she would choke on her spit-up. I remedied that worry with and Angelcare movement monitor to monitor her breathing. But as far as the spitting up, she did not have any allergies or anything to something I was eating. Her Dr. said she would grow out of it and she did by the time she was 6 or 7 months. She still nurses twice a day and we are all good and I have not added or taken away anything from my diet so I know her issue was certainly not any allergic reaction of any sort…it was just a phase for her. If you have taken the time to notice when she has had a bad reaction to something, you are doing the best that you can do. If she were allergic to something, I would think that there would be other symptoms as well and your doctor would make that assessment. Don't worry!! Just keep extra clothes, bibs and birth cloths handy!

Hi S.,
I have 5 daughters and nursed them all till they quit, the longest being 18 months.
Usually spitting up is from getting too much air and not burping it all up. when nursing, does your baby get as much of your areola in her mouth as possible? does she gulp? does she seem uncomfortable after? have you added to your diet any carbonated drink?
C. crothers

Same thing happened to me when my 5 month old son was just 2 months. He spit up a ton for a few days. It was really nasty when I was trying to nurse him and he threw up all over my boobs. And what was really embarrassing was that we thought he was done barfing, and so we took a family trip to hang out with some friends at their house. He threw up all over their sofa.....SO if you're planning on going anywhere make sure you bring extra clothes for her and yourself.

She might not be over eating, but something in the milk is making her that way. Try to cut out dairy from you diet for a few days and see what happens.

As long as she is having at least 6 wet diapers a day she is getting what she needs.I'm sure your DR. would let you know if she is not thriving. My son did spit up alot, and I would have been worried about it if I hadn't already experienced my sisters kids who spit up so much so often. I would advise you to contact La Leche League for advise, they are an awesome resourse. In their book, The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding they address spitting up (P.71) There is a quote, "in a healthy baby, spitting up is a laundry problem, not a medical problem". Call 1-800-LALECHE for a referal to a local LLL group. Keep up the great work, you are giving your daughter the Best!

I had the same problem with my daughter - here's what changed it for us - and it stopped almost immediately! Give her some chamomile tea with a pinch of brown sugar! mint or peppermint works too) A nurse and then my doctor told me that it will settle her stomach and it sure did! Here's how to do it:
Dunk the tea bag in a 1/2 cup of hot water three or four times (you don't want it too strong) then add the sugar (to cut the tartness) then add some cool water. Test it- make sure it is warm but not too warm. Then pour it into a baby bottle.
I gave my daughter 6 ounces to start and she sucked it all down! She loved it!

You can give you baby 4 ounces 2 times a day. If you see improvement, then you can give her one bottle a day at bedtime. I hope this works for you because my daughter threw up after EVERY feeding when I was nursing her and this stopped it cold! Good luck!

Oh, I had this too - or my son did. I couldn't figure out what made him spit up so much and when he drank out of the bottle, it did seem to be less than when he breastfed, but he still would spit up. He didn't seem to mind most the time, it was just something he did. But once in a while (like before he went to bed for the long stretch of sleep), I would give him 2 ml of Mylanta and that would seem to coat his throat and calm his tummy enough that he wouldn't be upset for bed (to lay down). Sometimes I would need a full apron! I would ask the dr. if my son was eating too much but she said that it's probably not the case, just some babies spit up. But he eventually grew out of it, like around 7 months or so (and I breastfed until 11 months). It was literally one day he didn't spit up, it was the strangest thing.

S. -
You are not alone! My first son (I have 4 kids) spit up all the time, never a fussy baby and ate wonderfully - he just spit up A LOT! In fact, one time (horror of horrors to a mom) he spit up right in my own mouth as I was speaking - talk about disgusting!! But your daughter may very well have a reflux or immature sphincter which would cause exactly what you are describing. When I was a teenager I used to babysit for a little boy that had this and I would have to feed him sitting off to the side because it would come right back up and I learned to get out of the way. Just be sure, and I'm know you are, to be in dialog with your doctor about this. Your little angel will be just fine!

Ok, it is not wheat. It turns into an amino acid when digested. I have 3 children who have Celiac Disease, this is how I know.
I also have a 2 1/2 month old who is reacting to cows milk. I have strictly breastfed him as well. My doctor says it can not be true lactose intolerance because breast milk has lactose. It is however DAIRY that upsets him. He can have a few good days, I eat dairy (even a minimal amount like one piece of macaroni and cheese) and he is automatically sick. He vomits, has diarrhea, gas, cries, etc. This is an intolerance to milk. It is the same one you hear about 'causing' ADHD and other problems. Different people react differently to the intolerance.
I have taken dairy out of my diet. It is poison to my son.
Since I have, he is perfectly healthy! My doctor has researched this now, and he (and our second opinion doctor) completely agrees with this. Also, if you know of Dr. Sears and Dr. Dobson, they both write about this.
Good Luck and God Bless You and Your Family

After posting my comment I read everyone else's, and I have to give my 2 cents.
First, a strictly breastfed baby can not and will not over eat. over eating is a learned action that is by no means possible to learn at this age.
Second, good weight gain is never an indicator of 'perfect health'. There are many serious disorders that affect children's digestive systems, with out affecting their weight.

Hi: Yes, your little angel may very well be allergic to something you are eating. It may be something different you have consumed or touched, or, it may be that she has developed an allergy to something that previously didn't seem to bother her.

My suggestion to you is that you visit NAET.com, order and read the book "Say Good-Bye to Children's Allergies" and make an appointment to consult with an NAET doctor at your first opportunity. I go to Dr. David Karaba in Fullerton and absolutely love him. His phone number is ###-###-####. One of the wonderful things about NAET is that for children or the infirm, they can be treated through a surrogate, i.e., you. Here is the description paragraph from the book information.

"Say Good-bye to Children’s Allergies
By - Devi S. Nambudripad, D.C., L.Ac., R.N., Ph.D.
Paperback-1st Edition 2000
350 pages, 8.5’ X 5.5’ X .75’
ISBN: ISBN: 0-###-###-####-8-4
In Say Good-bye to Children’s Allergies, Dr. Devi S. Nambudripad, the developer of NAET®, will help you understand your child’s illness and will assist you in finding the right help to achieve better health for your child. This book will show you how certain commonly used products in your foods and environment can cause health problems in your child; how you can test your child in your privacy of your own home using the Nambudripad’s Testing Techniques described in the book. This book will educate you how your child’s health problems can relate to allergy, a traditionally under-diagnosed or misdiagnosed condition; and, how allergies can manifest into myriad symptoms that might seem unrelated. The author also provides remedies for mild conditions of common childhood ailments arising from allergies and how to find help in assisting your child find the right help for serious problems such as, asthma, hay-fever, common colds, sinus problems, milk allergy, peanut allergy, sugar allergy, hives, gastritis, vomiting, colic for newborns, ear infections, irritable bowel syndrome, colitis, bronchitis, drug reactions, and many other conditions. Dr. Nambudripad explains how allergies are often the underlying causes to pediatric problems and how NAET® testing procedures and NAET® treatments can offer relief from these allergies. The book is supported by NAET® practitioners’ testimonials and patients’ success stories."

I gave up dairy when I noticed it was possibly bothering my daughter. I do recall that if they are teething they create allot of saliva which can make them spit up and also have a "fake cough"....I also would stop and burp her when I was breast feeding because she would get big air bubbles. I would almost always get a nice burp out of her. I had to stand up and put her on my shoulder to get a good one.

I hope this helps. My baby is almost a yr now, but what your saying seems awfully familiar. Don't worry!!

H.

If she is not in pain then I think you are right on about over eating. feed her more often but for less time each time. Babies will suck by nature so she will just keep sucking until she falls asleep. If she still wants to suck try a pacifier after she is done nursing.

My 2nd son (he's 10 months right now) has reflux so its a pretty crazy thing. He has good weeks where there's only a few spit ups a day (nice size puddles) and then he has bad weeks where you think he is not keeping anything down at all. Fortunately, there's no weight loss so he does not have to be on medication and it's just one of those things that he will eventually grow out of. But, if there is weight loss I would take your baby to a doctor for a diagnosis. And just to make you feel better, my oldest son is 2 years old and still spits up about once a month - it's almost like vomit but it doesn't bother him at all.