Wind and hiccups in newborns - help please!

[Ko]

Baby Ko has arrived and he is an absolute darling!! :)):)):))!!!

he is just over a week old and the main problem we have is wind and hiccups. he is bottle fed (hipp organic) and gets wind and hiccups which won't go for ages. he just keeps burping up more wind.

the midwife said bables can't get rid of all the wind in one go until they are a couple of months old. she said to get him to suck on cool boiled water which does help but it is still quite a problem. today we have spent a couple of hours trying to get rid of wind and hiccups.

does anyone have any tips? should i perhaps change formula?

is gripe water any better than cool boiled water?

sorry for so many questions! any advice most gratefully received. many thanks in advance!

ko xxx

[Pickle]

Congratulations Ko!!!!

I don't really have any advice - all we did with both babies was use Infacol before every feed, but admittedly neither one was terribly windy and we didn't use it for long. Worth a try if you haven't already used it?

Hope you're enjoying the newborn cuddles, my babies are both walking talking monsters now, I'm jealous!

[snowboarder]

Ah Ko congratulations!!!

We used infacol too (nice orangy burps!) - admittedly not as young as 1 week, but it did seem to help after a while. We also used (says quietly, so as not to be subject to comments as per another post) some homeopathic remedies, and, a little late in the day, some cranial osteopathy. It does just seem they eventually grow out of it but it's horrid at the time. There are various other things like colief but it was just too complicated with breastfeeding (involved use of bottle - so might work for you?).

Hope you are both doing well. xx

[Moos]

Congratulations Ko!!

Lovely news, and hope you are feeling well.

My only suggestion would be to ask your other mum or dad friends on winding tips. Try walking around, gently patting his back, try putting him down onto your lap and then back up onto your shoulder, just generally gently moving him around. Patting and firm stroking seemed to work best for my little one when he was little.

Also, if you aren't sure he has wind, you could try gently pressing the middle of his back. It sounds a bit weird, but if he has wind it will resist your touch a little but if not will be more flexible. It takes a while to get the hang of, but it's useful.

Best of luck, and congrats again.

[Belle]

Agree, ask everyone for winding tips - we ended up trying all sorts of weird and wonderful positions when the traditional sitting up/over the shoulder ones didn't work, and the ones we tried helped! The general rule we found with wind was: just when you think you've winded for ages...wind some more...and some more. It can dominate feeds/post feeding times in those early days but soon it'll be a thing of the past! also agree infacol seems to be good. I bottle feed too and I did hear that it can cause more wind, found it helped to feed baby in a more upright position (as opposed to the traditional more laidback position with bottle).

[Pickle]

A sure fire way to get my daughter to burp was to walk up and down the stairs with her, and my friend used a great position that she called "tiger in a tree" (no idea whether that's a technical name or something she made up!), which I don't have a chance of explaining without demonstrating - involved kind of draping the baby over your arm, with the head resting on your hand, and legs either side of the crook of your arm. Confused?!

[trinity]

Congratulations Ko

None of mine were very windy but I did notice my mother-in-law's very effective winding technique which was a quite firm circular motion on the baby's back whilst baby was against her shoulder - not gentle little pats as I had been doing.

I also thought you might want to make sure your lo isn't taking in too much air when bottle feeding particularly at the end of the bottle but I'm sure you've checked that.

Hope the wind isn't causing little ko too much distress.

Hugs to you both.

[Moos]

I've heard it said that dads make the best winders as they are a bit firmer with the baby ... not that I would want to encourage anyone to be too firm with a baby! but you know what I mean.

Also, it's nice for them to have a job that they do better than you, as it's easy for new dads to feel a bit left out.

[snowboarder]

Another tip for winding from my midwife was to sit the baby as upright as poss on your lap and use the heel of your hand on the left hand side of his back, gently, in an upwards motion.....am not sure of the science (think tummy on lhs?) but seemed to work!

[Belle]

Pickle - I know the position you mean - it's meant to be v calming for them as it kind of suspends them in womb-like manner (!) and is eases the stomach somehow.

My mum used to jiggle J on her lap and also walk around with him and kind of bounce up and down quite vigorously (!!) and that really seemed to help.

[Moos]

It's called 'Tiger in the Tree' - have been searching for illustrations on the web, but can only find pictures of actual tigers which may not be helpful...

[jollyrogers]

All the above seems good advice, the only other thing I would suggest is sitting the baby on your lap and holding his chin in your hand so that you hold his head up as you are rubbing his back. That definitely helped my babies. Congrats and enjoy - it doesn't last very long and trust me, before you know it they're 19 and don't need you any more!!

[Pickle]

... although perhaps looking at a picture of an actual tiger might help scare the wind up? I can lend you my son to do his best "scary tiger" noises ;-)

[amydown]

Hi Ko,

Congratulations! My little one's now 7 weeks and he too suffered from terrible winds in the first few weeks. I'm breastfeeding so might be different but midwife suggested stopping it halfway through if I can for an "interim burping session". Doing it this way seemed to shorten the time taken for him to burp and also, his projectil vomitting has significantly reduced at the same time.

I have noticed that in the last week or so, he has started burping on his on occasionally so like others are saying above, it must get better!! (I keep telling myself that...)

Hope you don't get too distressed. I remember being in tears because he was in such pain..

[ratty]

Another tip is to put him in a sling and walk round with him - saves on the arm muscles!

We used to have to do a sort of rocking dance, for some reason always in the kitchen, and usually between 2 and 4am every day! YAWN!

[Belle]

Amydown - my husband used to call that the 'half-time burp' :)

[ludoscotts]

congratulations on your little one arriving- have you tried different bottles and formula?E was terrible on sma gold really chronic wind and unhappy all the time for the first couple of weeks then I couldnt get that type one day so had to buy cow and gate she was better from the first bottle of the different formula. I tried the sma again just to see and she was windy again so she was def better on cow and gate over sma so worth tying a different type. And also the bottles different ones suit different babies.

it does get better though and does fly by sooo quickly Eis 2 today and I have no idea where the last 2 years have gone.

[charlottep]

I found the Dr Brown bottles helped my very windy baby, the reservoir thingy in the bottle really did the trick. Cranial Osteopathy also seemed to help a lot, after 3 sessions he was burping like a trooper, although maybe that was just coincidental timing.

[laurac]

My daughter had really bad wind initially and Pickles stair-bouncing and 'tiger in a tree' both worked really well. Another good technique shown me by a midwife friend is to sit the baby on your lap and hold them with one hand under the chin. Using the other hand you gently rotate them from the waist - I hope that makes sense - it takes a bit of practice but really really works if you do it immediately after finished feeding.

[helena handbasket]

This might sound strange, but we found that gently sitting and bouncing on one of those big yoga balls (the kind often used in labour) while we winded our little guy seemed to work a bit. Maybe it was just soothing, but it certainly calmed him when nothing else would!

[Ko]

a huge, huge thank you to everyone for their best wishes and their advice!! mr ko was dispatched first thing yesterday morning to the chemist to get infacol which has helped a bit thankfully (famous last words...)

community midwife also showed me to tilt up the bottle more to stop as much air getting sucked in. it was great to be reminded about all the obvious things and reassuring that so mnay people said similar things. sounds like we have been far from alone with this problem.

once again, many thanks xxx