misery = constipation (from solutabs??)

[Anonymous]

My son Ben was doing so well – and as luck would have it as soon as i said we would SKIP the upper GI and at about week 3-4 of prevacid solutabs – our luck changed. our issues are still about sleep mostly, although the happy guy has some increased daytime misery too. wonder if this is becoming a learned thing…

he seems to be VERY uncomfortable from constipation – and i have heard from some that prevacid can do this. i wonder if getting the cara cream will help (should be here any day…) and if the lactose is affecting him after some time on the solutabs.

he was sleeping great for about a week or so (only waking 2x night) and now is up at least 3x and if i soothe him by BF-ing he wakes an hour after i have laid him down – almost like clock work. i have been keeping him upright over my shoulder after feeding b/c he really seems to need that gravitational help… but i can only function SO well and SO much at 12 – 3, 4, 5 and 6 am!

i have to admit to having NOT done TED yet which kind of haunts me. I don’t know why tho – i have already given up so much food and stuck to the BFing that it should be no big deal. i just can’t imagine it. i ahve given up wheat (wondering about the gluten – wheat connection), dairy, soy, nuts, citrus, tomatoes, beans, broccoli…there must be more. and had we not seen the improvement i would have jumped into TED. but i now question the wheat but am too chicken to eat some to test it out. i can’t bear the thought of creating a miserable night on purpose…

and the final issue: on Friday we see our half baked PedGI who has so many marks against her in my book that i wonder why i am going – except maybe to ask her to change script to Zegerid? she doesn’t even know about the good 30mg dose of Prevacid that our PED ok-ed or that i took ben to an acupuncturist. this woman actually asked me why i would still be BFing and wasn’t my son possibly allergic to MY milk? that seems so ignorant to me. she also knew nothing about OAL – which at the onset i had researched.

do i give the capsules a try? does anyone know if they help with this horrible constipation? it seems to be as much of a discomfort to him as the reflux!!! or any other thoughts?

also wondering how FInnsMom and ErinTX are doing…our 3 boys are within days of each other…how goes the battle????

off to sleep…HA!

[Anonymous]

the only advice I can give is if you do not get along withyour GI get another one. We did. And within 4 months we saw a drastic improvement in Jedd’s reflux issues. It is amazing what you can get done when the Dr and you work together.

Remember, the GI works for YOU….You pay him to do his/her job. If you don’t like them, find someoen you do.

We have a great “team” working with Jed and it is amazing. by “team” I mean, a Ped, a ENT, GI, Rehab center, Pedi., 2 surgeons, a Urologist (who also does surgery), and an Early Intervention team. As well as 2 Dr out of state.

They all communicate very well to each other to get the job done. It took a bit to get all that done and to get ones that worked well together but once we did, things happend quickly.

[Anonymous]

Okay, so the first thing that jumps @ me is you saying “constipation”. It is very rare for a bf baby to truly be constipated. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but what make you think/say constipation?

I mistakingly said this too early on but then realized I was really talking about: straining, grunting, thrashing legs, explosive gas, etc. His stools were still soft though.

So, in my mind I’m thinking Finn is still experiencing intolerances. I don’t remember… how are his diapers when he does go. Also, does he have stinky gas?

I know you mentioned the meds… Evan gets intestinal/tummy pain from Prevacid but no grunting, straining, red face, etc.

I know you don’t want to hear it, but maybe just give TED a chance for 2-3 weeks & see if you notice even more improvement. Since you’ve already removed the “biggies” (dairy, soy, wheat) then the other things should only take 4-5 days to be removed (although it could take a bit longer for the colon to heal if there’s inflammation). Hope that makes sense.

We are doing well… still hanging in there. I’m still just eating pears, potatoes & beef. I’m doing a peach trial right now – so far so good (crossing fingers). Sleep has significantly improved very recently.

Hang in there & keep us updated.

[hellbennt]

kboben wrote: … our issues are still about sleep mostly, although the happy guy has some increased daytime misery too. wonder if this is becoming a learned thing…

yikes! I would not go down the road of thinking anything other than:

“I haven’t gotten the whoe diet/medicine scene figured out just yet, so until then, I cannot even THINK about sleep or sleep training or anything of the sort…”

so in my humble opinion: please please do not even consider that his erratic sleep may be a ‘learned’ thing…

hang in there!!

it WILL GET BETTER!

[Anonymous]

thanks everyone.

we are not considering sleep training yet at all. just wondering sometimes if he is USED to crying when i lay him down or to thrashing – and i don’;t always chalk it up to discomfort. i know his night waking is due to discomfort and his thrashing while nursing is back…

constipation i base on a few things – he pushes and strains and tries to poop and goes at least a day every few days without a BM and these nights has a rough time of it…while pushing and having this abdominal pain and grunting. he does have loose and stinky, mucousy stool and gas too. occasionally green.

another reason i think constipation is that my mom’s friend had 3 of her 5 breastfed kids with reflux and she had been writing to me about how in the end with all of them the prevacid (which does list constipation as a known side effect) caused severe constipation and when they went off of it it was fine. she said the constipation was a bigger problem at times than the reflux. she also advises me to NOT introduce any cereals at all but to skip right to bananas (don’t they bind you up?) and avocados and to wait until 8 mos. Ben seems to SO want to eat food…

i have read about enough people on these forums saying it somehow bothers their kids tummies – so i wonder. i was hoping going to the caps with caracream might help. and tonight i messed up the timing and he was screaming/ starving so i just skipped the meds for the first time. hope i don’t regret that!!!! but the alternative seemed torturous and it was my own fault!

i wonder about Erin and Evan – he is not on prevacid but is on Axid when needed – how often? and is Axid a PPI? is this b/c prevcid didn’t agree with him?

i will try TED. i just wonder how eating things like healthy veggies (not gassy ones) and apples and basically GOOD non acidic food outside pears and potatoes and turkey can be bad. how many TED moms find that these healthy alkaline foods (peaches?) cause problems. i was sticking first to the known foods to avoid and adding into that acidic foods and those i could spot a reaction from…but i am not opposed to trying it out. i’d do anything that helps. it just seems a bit extreme – but that’s the point i guess.

in a few weak moments i have considered that he might be better off with formula – wonder if a good week of that (while i pumped and ate right still) would show improvement. or would i maybe even learn that he cannot tolerate the alimentum too?

and lastly (for this late hour) i agree about getting a new doc. i have gotten so much help from our ped that after tomorrow if this visit is not what i need it to be then i will get a new ped GI or deal with our super pediatrician.

agh. i had no idea this reflux would take over life like this…these poor babies.

[Anonymous]

hi kristin…. isn’t this frustrating?
i am under the impression that constipation would also mean hard stools. i think that straining, grunting, etc. indicates intolerance/sensitivities.

however, i do think that babies could also be sensitive to the prevacid–solutabs esp. We went off the solutabs and started TED at the same time. one of those 2 changes helped Finn to have BMs more often and eliminated the grunting.
Go for the capsules–at least they’re more pure than the solutabs. aspartame seems like a likely irritant to me. we gave them in pureed pears for a while…but the caracream brought so much relief by getting rid of the wait time.

the TED is a systematic way to figure out what does bother Ben…it’s not that eating seemingly nonoffensive foods is bad…. TED just helps to narrow everything down–

I’m going to post my NAET info under the TED forum–

Your ped. GI sounds horrible. that bfing comment would put me over the edge! my first ped. made a comment like that too. it’s odd when they seem clueless like that.

oh and the green poo— while my ped. says it means nothing, numerous people have told me that it indicates intolerance/allergy. or…. if it’s green and frothy and you have OAL it could mean not enough hindmilk. (i can’t remember if this is true for you?)

i’m from newport…so close to bristol (well, isn’t everything close in RI?)

you are working so hard and doing an excellent job, kristin.
xxoo

[hellbennt]

kristin,

this is all so confusing, I know, but there is a lot of helpful info here- go chck out the TED forum and before you know it you’ll have a handle on all the intolerance/diet stuff.

I also ditto that what you’re describing is not constipation…breastfed babies can go quite a while without pooping and it’s perfectly normal. http://www.kellymom.com is an excellent resource as is http://www.askdrsears.com

it seems to me that what you’re describing goes along more with intolerances/allergies…if you go to the ‘main’ (stickied) MSPI thread (in the MSPI forum I think) & you go to page 2, there’s an EXCELLENT article that really explains the differences b/t allergies & intolerances…also form that link look for the link called ‘Misconceptions about Elemental Formulas- this explains things too

you CAN do this!! hang in there!

we’re all here to help!!

[Anonymous]

I definitely agree that the loose, green, stinky mucousy stools are a sign of intolerance.

The purpose of TED it to eliminate all foods except the least allergenic in each food group. Then, you slowly add in low allergen type foods to note reaction, etc. The more foods you have in the mix the harder it is to find the cuplrit.

Evan is on Axid (an H2 blocker, not a PPI) b/c that is all he needs @ this point. His reflux is intolerance related (not very common fwiw) so once all those offenders were removed from my diet via TED (for many many weeks) his reflux disappeared too.

We only give him Axid before bed & that’s only bc things are going so well in the sleep dept & I don’t want to change a thing. He doesn’t get any al day long so I think he’d be fine w/o it for night too.

[Author]

Posts