March 2008 Expecting Club

Ok ladies, I need some help here!!!!

Lily is generally a very happy, very easy going baby. She sleeps a lot during the day and usually is happy when she is fed and awake. The problem is that she seems to be really having some serious issues with her little tummy. I'm not sure if it is just gas or if it is reflux or what. I know Zoey had gas issues but they did not seem this bad!!!

Basically for several hours, usually at night but it seems to be getting more frequent, she will start writhing in pain and grunting and stirring and often crying. If she is asleep, she will be still for maybe a minute, and then start kicking or lifting her legs, moving around, grunting and fussing for about a minute. Then she is still again. You could seriously time this, it happens so regularly every minute or so. This often goes on for hours. If she is already asleep, she will often stay asleep and do this in her sleep, but if she is awake, she will have a lot of difficulty falling asleep because of this. If I am trying to put her down for the night or after a night feed, I will often have to lay with my arms in her basinette - one holding a soother in her mouth and the other patting her back as she grunts and squirms around. She does not spit up ever. No amount of burping, gas drops, or even gripe water helps with this issue...the only thing I can do at night is bring her into bed and rub her back and pat her bum while she is having these issues. Of course, that means I am often sleeping with her, which I don't want to do!!!

Any ideas?? Is anyone else's LO having this issue? I'm wondering if she has something actually wrong with her little tummy...

Mine seems to do it in the middle of the night and so do the babies of some other moms on the board. Have you tried bicycling her legs? Sometimes you can get them to pass gas if you rub their tummies a bit and then cycle their legs, or pull them up toward their head. It seems like most people don't have too much luck with the gas drops and we haven't messed with them yet. Fussiness also is still building right now... it peaks at around 6 weeks they say. Hang in there, you're not alone.

It really is frustrating--I've been reading up on colic and fussiness and it seems like babies who have things like GER are fussy for more hours or seem like they're in tons more pain. All I can think of for our baby is that he has garden variety gas, or he's possibly irritated by something I'm eating. Doing an elimination diet isn't for the faint of heart so I'm trying to see if we can relieve the gas before we try that--let me know if you find something that works too!