Doctor say he is a colic bady. Almost 6 weeks old. gaining weight,checkups great. Daughter is trying Baby Whisper and baby wise. Please any advice... i just order them colic clam to try. This is really hard for my daughter she so wanted to enjoy this time in her life. She does breast-feed. She has taken him to a chiropractor. He has done some better,so she will cont.taking him. It is just very hard on them and i live in another state.Thanks for all the responses we are getting. So helpful. Update: so far nothing is working. Could it be this 6wk. old just does not want to sleep????
Now at 7week old, they are taking him to a pediatric gi spec. hope this will help. thanks for all the advice it was very helpful.
This is a hard time for almost ALL new moms, even if the baby doesn't have colic. They get no sleep and are pretty overwhelmed.
The worst of it should be over in a couple of months. Meanwhile, grandma, help her by babysitting and letting her get a break when you can.
Please stay away from Babywise! THe author has *zero* medical training!! She needs to follow baby's lead for feeding and sleep. Not baby following her lead.
Yes, it's hard but all babies are different and not all babies are angel babies. Some are high needs. Like your grandson. Buy her a mayawrap and tell her to wear him as much as he needs. That is comforting and soothing. My mayawrap was a life-saver with my high needs preemie.
Dr. Sears also has good information on parenting a high needs baby.
Google 4th trimester. That is where he still is. He still wants/needs/craves the comforts of the womb.
Is she nursing? She may look at doing an elimination diet to see if that helps. It can take a few weeks for things like dairy and wheat to clear her system so it doesn't work over night.
I had 2 colic babies and the ONLY thing that saved my sanity was to hire a upper elementary/ middle school girl to hold the baby for 2 hours to 4 hours a day so the colic would subside. My children only screamed when not held a certain way so it was the perfect fix (Her mom didn't have to worry what her daughter was getting into, the girl got paid 2 dollars an hour to hold babies and I could clean house). I suggest a mother's helper. she M. need someone in the highschool or collage ages mattering how the colic presents (goes away if held just right? or even crys when sleeping?) and needing to just get away but still have someone there to watch the baby in case mom's nerves are just too frayed.
If you can, I would suggest that you find out when the crying fit starts and try to show up about 1 hour after it starts. By the 1 hour make parent's emotions are getting frayed and they need to have someone fresh to hand baby off to.
I have no direct experience with colic although I did have a brief period where I thought my son might be but it turned out to be just gas. Colic Calm did help. But if yours does in fact have colic, I agree that the best things are swaddling / close carrying with a wrap; nursing (breast is best - maybe with the elimination diet as mentioned); and infant massage. True it doesn't happen overnight but be consistent and just when you think it's hard to continue you will see the changes.
Is she nursing him? She may have an undiagnosed thrush infection. I had no symptoms and my daughter was fussy for 16 weeks, until someone at LLL told me to try methyl blue. It worked for a couple of days, which meant that I did have thrush, and then I took some acidophilus tablets, pretty cheap, and it worked. Neither I, nor my daughter, had signs of thrush...and if it isn't thrush the acidophilus wouldn't hurt anything.
The other option is happiest baby on the block, but if it is thrush, I don't think that will work.
My second son was very colicky as well. It started when he was about 6 weeks old and continued until he was 13-14 weeks old. It was a very trying time! If you have never had a colicky baby, then you just don't understand how hard it is. I totally agree with MamaMay. She needs an extra set of hands to help her keep a handle on things. Letting him cry is not going to help either of them. Hearing him cry is going to make her anxiety level stay high. Here are some things that I tried with my son: Hyland's colic tablets (worked okay), gripe water did not work, tummy massage, riding in the car, putting him in his car seat and placing it on the washing machine while washing clothes (worked GREAT!), and carrying him in a pouch sling. I bought the one made by Slinglings. It was the most valuable purchase that I made. They are custom made to fit you based on your measurements. I wore him in the sling until he was 10 months old. SO comfortable. My mom helped me when she could. I should have hired a student to help me! Tell her to get out of the house as much as the weather will allow. Put him in a stroller and go to the park or local mall. I got a sitter to keep him when I went back to work at 10 weeks and she quit after 1 month. On the upside, it DOES get better eventually. Care.com is a great resource for finding sitters and helpers for moms. I found a great nanny on their site.
Tell her good luck and it WILL get BETTER!!! God bless!!!!
My oldest daughter had colic and it was very hard. She only slept for 30 min to an hour at a time and when she was awake she screamed non-stop. I tried everything. Swaddling, homeopathic remedies, Little Tummies drops, swings, bouncy seats, car rides... you name it. Some things would work for a moment but the only thing that truly worked was time and patience. The colic started at 2 weeks and lasted until she was 12 weeks. Then... it just stopped. Suddenly, she would sleep for 4 to 6 hours at a time and was happy while she was awake (mostly). I know that you'd rather have some magic wand that instantly makes this stop but there just isn't one. Just be patient and know that it won't last forever.
I do not have any specific help to offer other than just hold the baby and try not to go crazy. I dealt with the same thing with my daughter and it was very trying. It sounds like your daughter is taking even more steps for relief than I did. There were many weeks that I felt like I was in robot mode, just doing whatever I needed to do to comfort my baby girl and like you suggested, it was not overly enjoyable for me. I just wanted to say that it will get better!! My daughter's seemed to be a security thing -- needing lots of holding and swaddling and closeness to me. Once she was not crying all the time, it was like a miracle relief to a long endured pain -- I loved and appreciated her so much more. She was still clingy to me for a long time, but she just turned two and is a happy, independent and saucy little lady. I do not look back at those weeks with any negativity, and once your daughter gets past this phase I do not think she will either. Tell her to just hold on (literally!) and this too shall pass. I am sending prayers her way!
Dr. Harvey Karp, author of The Happiest Baby on the Block, explains why babies run pretty much according to their own needs for the first 3-4 months. He calls this the Fourth Trimester, during which babies are still making the demanding transition to life outside the womb. There are some wonderful suggestions in these clips that will help your daughter have a calmer, happier experience with her baby:
How-to's: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6KnVPUdEgQ&feature=re...
Enhanced sleep: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tk5MUOMecHI&NR=1
Interview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu0TtxO-ocY&feature=re...
Stay far away from Babywise – it is a dreadful approach, and very few babies adapt to it. The minority who adapt are paraded as the "success stories," but the majority of babies (and their mothers) don't do well with that tight scheduling in their first few months, and some experience "failure to thrive." Here's what more than a hundred families who have tried Babywise had to say about the book: http://www.amazon.com/Becoming-Baby-Wise-Giving-Nighttime... . The author, Gary Ezzo, has no medical training, and his advice has been soundly discredited in most medical schools. Even his original publisher refused to continue producing this book when it became apparent that the babywise approach was actually harming some babies and creating unnecessary distress for many families.
We had a family friend with a colic baby and they took him to the chiropractor. It seemed to help a ton.
My son was very cranky. I also breastfed and his pediatrician told me to lay off eating any dairy products (because he may be lactose intolerant) to see if that helped. It worked wonders. He cried a lot less and was happier. It just meant that while I was nursing, I could not have dairy. I started eating a little dairy when he was about 6 months old and just added a little more every month. I nursed him until he was 12 months old.
