So sick of wearing this baby!!!

[Anonymous]

Hi everyone,

I feel bad for posting here because a) I’m not a regular and b) I know most of you have it way worse than I do. But I just can’t take it anymore today.

I know people spout the wonders/benefits/joys of babywearing but I’m so tired of it. I wear Tess practically all day long because otherwise she fusses/cries/screams. Some of that I’m sure it due to the reflux but I think part of it is just her personality, too. Sigh. It would be one thing if I could put her in the Bjorn or wrap and then go about my business but that’s not how it works. I have to be constantly moving. No standing still to, say, wash dishes or fix lunch. Absolutely NO sitting! Even when she’s asleep her baby ninja senses can tell that I’m sitting down somehow. I pretty much have to walk from room to room in the house to keep her happy. I feel like I have the knees of an 80-year-old woman anymore. They hurt all of the time from the constant standing. My wrists are already shot from all of the holding I did before she would tolerate the Bjorn/wrap.

And lately everything else seems to be going to cr@p. Tess appears to have outgrown her dose of Zantac. We upped it. It worked for 2 days and then the fussing/arching/squirming started again. Her nighttime sleep, which was pretty good 3 weeks ago, is getting worse. Her daytime sleep has always been horrible. She will only sleep in the wrap and even then she only stays asleep for 30 minutes anymore. We tried Prevacid without much luck. We went back to just Zantac and had about 3 good weeks. That was it. We’re off to the doc again today to see what we try next. I’m so pessimistic anymore. I hate to say it but I feel like we never should have had another kid.

Thanks for listening.

Karen

[Anonymous]

When you say you tried Prevacid without much luck, what dose were you
on and how long did you give it? Keep in mind that it can take up to 2
weeks to see results on any PPI (you can keep giving Zantac spaced out
in the meantime) and with Prevacid you can see gas pains until your
baby adjusts.

From your description, it sounds like Tess is still in pain and should
be on a good dose of a PPI – can you get back to a good Ped GI (we can
give recommendations) and try again?

I hope things get better soon.

[Anonymous]

We were on 12mg of Prevacid daily (one dose). We visited two Ped GI’s. The first wouldn’t even consider a PPI – said the Zantac was fine and keep doing that for another month then come back. Went back to our regular ped and he gave us the Prevacid. Granted we only really tried it for about 10 days but not only were things not getting better but they were getting worse. Our ped didn’t want us doing the Zantac and the Prevacid together. We went against his advice and did it anyway while we waited to see another Ped GI. This guy practically called CPS on me for giving my baby “so much medicine”. He told me to stop all meds and gave me a script for Prilosec but at basically the same dose as the Prevacid. I figured what’s the point? So we went back to just the Zantac and things actually got better for a short time. By that I mean we finally were able to put her in her crib to sleep at night instead of sleeping with in the recliner.

I really don’t think any other local Ped GI is going to tell us anything different. None of them wanted to up her meds, certainly not to the level that is listed on the Marci Kids website. I trust our regular ped – he had a reflux baby himself – but we’ll see what he has to say today. I just can’t devote 110% of my time and energy to this baby anymore. I have another DD who is neglected because of her sister, I have a job that I can’t do because of it, I have a house that is never clean and a family that only eats frozen dinners.

Karen

[Anonymous]

That does seem like a low dose of Prevacid but additionally, once a day
is not good for any baby. Babies metabolize PPIs MUCH faster than
adults and need at least 2xday dosing. Can you ask your doctor do do
7.5mg of Prevacid twice a day? That’s a very generally accepted dose
and might do Tess some good. It’s not nearly as high as Marci Kids
dosing but that’s OK and it might help.

The problem with Zantac is that babies adjust to the dose and need an
increase VERY quickly and many develop a tolerance to the drug
altogether.

Hopefully your Ped agrees to try 7.5 mg twice a day and then you can give Zantac (or at least Mylanta) until it kicks in.

In the meantime, big hugs to you and your family – I know it’s tough.

[Anonymous]

Hi Karen,

So sorry to hear you’re going through this. I know it’s tough.

Just curious-do they have any idea of why she has the reflux? My son had/has an extreme case of it. It took us a month of prevacid (30mg) to see a difference and even then it comes and goes. We also didn’t see a result on meds until we took rice out of his bottles. I don’t know if your formula or breastfeeding but if so, maybe a diet change? I would break up the dose as well.

Finally, Ian had colic on top of everything else-allergies/reflux. And it literally disappeared like magic after 4 months so I”ll cross my fingers for you that it’ll be the same.

Hope this helps.

Tracy (Ian’s Mom 9-26-05) Elecare and prevacid

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice and the support, ladies. I honestly don’t know how those of you with really bad refluxers do it.

I just saw the doc and we’re going to try 3 doses a day of Zantac. I’ll give this a week or so to work and then if we’re still having problems I guess I’ll ask about trying the Prevacid again. We were doing the solutabs so spliting the dose requires cutting up the tablets. Not a huge deal but not as easy as with liquids. We still have a bunch of the solutabs but I feel funny about messing around with them without talking to my ped first. I already feel bad about using the Zantac and Prevacid together since he told us not to. I think the last GI squealed on me about that. Oh well.

As for allergies, we’re on formula and had been using Alimentum but we switched back to regular Similac about a month ago. She never showed any signs of allergies and the switch hasn’t seemed to bother her at all.

I was told that my first DD had colic. Turns out it was just her temperament. She’s a high needs kid. I got so depressed with each passing month when her “colic” didn’t magically disappear. We’re already past 4 months with Tess. I’m not holding my breath.

Karen

momtotess2006-5-8 13:16:39

[Anonymous]

I hope the Zantac three times a day gives Tess (and you) some relief. If it doesn’t trying Prevacid twice per day and Zantac mid day may do the trick like Karen mentioned.

As for your “state of mind” let me say I’ve been there and I still come and go from that “wish I never had another baby” thinking. I’m there today as a matter of fact. Myles has been puking constantly, refusing bottles, and whining and crying unless he is held or entertained. Like you, I often feel like I am neglecting my older children because Myles is so much work. It was even worse when Ellie was a baby. She was a cling on like Tess. I had to hold her all day and it drove me nuts. She cried constantly and I couldn’t take her anywhere without her screaming. But, she outgrew it (at around 8 months – the same time she outgrew reflux) and she is the most delightful, happy, toddler today. She truly is pure joy!! I try to keep that in mind when I am at my whits end with Myles; that he will one day be a cute, active, toddler and those long days of carrying him and coddling him will finally be done. The reflux will pass and hopefully be repressed from my memory for good. And it will pass for you and Tess, too. It really is very, very hard work taking care of a baby; any baby, but a baby with reflux is exponentially more difficult. And add on a “high needs” kind of personality and you’ve really got your work cut out for you.

Well, I just wanted to let you know that I (and I’m sure many other moms out there) have felt the way you do. It’s just so very hard. Do you have anyone to help out and give you a break once in a while?

[Anonymous]

Karen,

All I can say is that I feel your pain!!!! Boy, do I understand where you’re coming from! Hailey is almost a year old, and I still have those kind of days where I want to hop on the nearest bus and assume a new identity. Having a refluxer is such hard work..having a colicky refluxer is that much harder- especially when you have other kids to deal with. Mine are 20 months apart. Add on a high needs personality (or worse like Hailey) and oh what a blast!!!??? Even the good days are bad. Christine offers me hope that one day Hailey will outgrow it too just like her daughter did (though we haven’t yet at almost a year). And Tess will outgrow it too, and become the sweetest child. It will all be worth it in the end. Though I know it’s awful in the meantime. All I can say is hang in there, and try to steal a moment away for yourself if you can. Remember, this too shall pass. That’s what I tell myself (as I’m cursing under my breath). Hopefully when she gets more comfortable, she won’t be attached to you anymore. I remember thinking after Hailey was born and I had to literally carry her non-stop pacing the floor for six months that I carried her for 9 months, and now I was more than ready to separate. But she sure wasn’t. Like I said, hang in there- we’re all here for you.

[hellbennt]

it totally sounds like your baby isn’t on enough medication.

it sounds like she’s distressed and I know that zantac isn’t ‘enough’ for a lot of babies…

i know i sound like a drug pusher & I’m not, I’m just a mama who has been educating herself about infant(toddler) relfux to close to 3 yrs…

[Anonymous]

It does get better! Please hang in there. First, I wanted to say that you don’t need to apologize for complaining about a refluxer that’s “not that bad”. It sounds like she is not an easy baby by any stretch of the imagination, so you have no need to apologize. Kaelyn was a lot like Tess when she was younger. I was never able to put her down. I guess we were lucky that just swaying was sometimes enough, so I could do dishes by wearing her and swaying back and forth. Like you said, that gets really old pretty fast. One of my biggest fears about this new baby is that she’ll be another demanding refluxer. That being said, Kaelyn has grown into a wonderfully enjoyable toddler. She still has the occasional reflux episodes, but things are going really well overall. She was close to a year before we felt like things were really under control and she was 20 months old (I think) before we were able to take her off prevacid.

As Laura said, I hate to sound like a drug pusher, but we kept increasing Kaelyn’s zantac and we never really found any relief. She was up to 4 doses a day (I think it was .7 ml per dose, but my memory could be faulty). We didn’t get any relief until she was on prevacid. Even then, we saw some improvement after 2 weeks, but it was close to a month before we saw a drastic change. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Hi Karen, it seams that my son, Michael, is (almost) exactly like Tess. He is on the Alementum forumla and he gets .5ml of pepsid. He is 6 weeks old and weighs 10 LBS (if not more by now) now and he is not spitting up as much and the screaming episodes are not as frequent BUT he does not sleep comfortably. One day he will sleep like a well baby and then the next week he is all over the place. Don’t feel bad about your frustration because I am in the same boat as you (and I am sure hundreds of other women are too). The only way Michael sleeps now is in my arms (or my MOM’S) and he will only sleep for about 1 hour until he starts tossing around. Then I have to get his pacifyer and hope he takes it and goes back to sleep (again and still in my arms). I don’t know much about changing the meds since he has only been on the Pepsid for 3 weeks now. I tried the Prevacid but I didn’t see any change (although he was only on it for 2 days)???.. I just get to a point that I want to hand him off to somebody else and get lost for a day, BUT I could never ever do such a thing. We all have to hang in there and keep trying new things, although that gets pretty old quick. I will keep watching the board to see if Tess is getting better.

As they all say, “HANG IN THERE!” (like that helps).

Not so much help.

Teresa

[Anonymous]

teresa, prevacid, and most other ppi’s take at least two weeks to work, you won’t see any improvement after being on it for only 2 days. My little guy has been on it since he was about a month old, and I won’t let them take him off it til he’s a year.It’s been awesome.

[hellbennt]

After Zantac (or Pepsid or Tagament, these are acid blockers), our GERDlings usually ‘move on’ to a PPI (proton pump inhibitor) such as Prilosec or Prevacid (or nexium or protinix).

*If your baby is prescribed a PPI (prilosec/prevacid/nexium), it can take a while to ‘kick in.’ It can take up to 2 weeks for the PPI to ‘kick in’, so in the meantime, many of our babies have continued w/ the zantac. The prilosec kicked in for Jonah on day 12. So, you’ll probably want to [read: SHOULD] keep your baby on zantac until the PPI kicks in bcse otherwise, it’s as if your baby isn’t on any meds at all. I learned this the HARD WAY!

Zantac & PPIs: https://www.infantreflux.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=546&am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;am p;KW=dr+philips&PN=0&TPN=1

After being on the board for two years now [at the time of this edit], I can tell you that you should ‘check’ your baby’s PPI dose, because oftentimes, it is NOT high enough to be effective!!!!

PPI dosing chart: https://www.infantreflux.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=2668&a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;a mp;PN=1&TPN=1

[Anonymous]

Hey everyone,

I should have posted sooner and said thanks for all of the support. Here’s an update…

We moved on to Prilosec about 2 weeks ago. We went ahead and kept Tess on the Zantac while we waited for the Prilosec to start working, against our doctor’s orders. There was no way I was going to let her be completely unmedicated for possibly as long as 2 weeks! So I devised a system where every 2 days we would reduce her Zantac dose until after a week she would only be on the Prilosec. Things went well but then around day 4 or 5 she got totally constipated! The poor thing was actually crying when she would try to poop. I knew it was probably due to the meds so we stopped the Zantac early. A day or so later she was finally able to pass some stools again and yesterday was the first day her poops where back to “normal”. So there’s that. But the good news is that the Prilosec seems to be working very well. I know her dose is on the low side, even by our doc’s standards (forget the MARCI site) because the script was already 1.5 months old when we filled it. But we have a check up in a few weeks with the GI so we’ll see what he says then. In the meantime, we haven’t had a single reflux episode. I’m almost afraid to post that for fear of jinxing us!

We’re now working on getting her on a routine for naps and whatnot. She still seems to want to eat a lot and every now and then I worry that she’s comfort eating but I really haven’t seen any signs of her being in pain so I try to let it go. She takes her medicine like a champ and now only sleeps in the crib. In fact, I put away the wrap and rarely put her in the Bjorn (usually just when she’s overtired). Ahhh!!!

Thanks for commiserating with me. I hope that this is the start of a new era for us. I realize that there can be setbacks but I’m trying to stay positive. Thanks again, everyone!

Karen

[Anonymous]

Good news! I hope it continues.

[Author]

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