Homeopathic remedy for newborn reflux?

[*Amy*]

Hi mamas,
After about 2 weeks off and on of sleepless nights and a very sad an uncomfortable baby, I went to the doctor and we agreed it sounds like reflux. My DD is now on 00.9ml of Xantac twice a day. She's improved dramatically but I just hate giving her medicine so frequently - she's only 7 weeks old!

I am so uneducated about homeopathic/herbal remedies, but I thought y'all might know of something safe and effective.

Oh, I've already eliminated dairy from my diet and that has helped in terms of decreasing the spitting up, but she was still in obvious pain just moments after nursing until we used Xantac.

[RachelGS]

Personally, I'd treat reflux medically. My DD had some esophogeal damage from hers, and it was a complete and total nightmare. Nat phos can help heal the esophogus but won't stop the reflux itself.

The best thing I ever did for Abigail's reflux was to go off dairy (and several other foods). Reflux is very reactive to food sensitivities. Elimination diets are HARD at first, but you get used to them, and seeing your baby stop hurting makes it totally worth it.

[Bookworm]

Just dairy didn't work for us- we had to give up soy, too. When I tried adding soy back in, things did not go well.

[stellimamo]

I'd have to second that it needs to be medically treated. my little one is on 3ml of prilosec 2x a day. Zantac didn't work for her. Grip water helped a bit though in between doses. Also make sure as she grows that her dosage gets ajusted. We had problems w/ dd "growing out" of her dosage. Good Luck!!

[addiesmom]

Another here chiming in to treat it medically along with playing with your diet. DD had pretty bad reflux and was treated with Prilosec and I had to eliminate dairy and soy from my diet. I was able to wean her off of the meds by 9 mos and she was able to tolerate dairy (as long as it was organic) by 15 mos and soy by 18 mos. DS is 8 mos now and we are currently weaning him off of Zantac with good results. With him, I had to eliminate dairy, soy, wheat and nuts, but was able to add most of them back to my diet by the time he was 6 mos.

It may seem like forever, but babies GI systems develop pretty quickly and *most* babies can be taken off meds by 1 yr and outgrow their food intolerances by 1-2 yrs.

[dachshundqueen]

Infant Reflux/GERD

I would also recommend letting the pedi look at your child.

In addition to the reflux medication, I have had to limit my diet to exclude dairy, wheat, soy and eggs. We only reintroduced the eggs into my diet within the past two weeks, and only once a week.

Reflux is tricky as it can also present some of the same symptoms as infant food sensitivities.

You will also want to put baby at an angle (head up obviously) after feeding for at least 30 minutes. In addition, if baby is consistently spitting up and you are offering both breasts at each feeding, try offering only one breast per feeding to limit the amount of foremilk baby is getting and increase the higher calorie but denser (not sure what word I'm looking for - it's just less fluid but it is more nutritive) hindmilk. If you are able to, get baby to sleep on an incline. I let Annabelle sleep on my folded forearm in the early days.

GL

Elizabeth

[cynotgirl]

Amy, I agree with the other posters to experiment with your diet, and treat medically. It's so uncomfortable for your baby, and truthfully, no natural remedy works as well... MIL is a ped. nurse and and "expert" on this. She is usually very pro-natural, but she advised us on this topic. Also, be sure to elevate baby's sleeping area (ours was in a bassinet for this reason, to elevate head. MIL suggested letting baby sleep in the car seat carrier on really bad nights. worked great) and keeping baby upright 30 minutes after feedings. this was really hard for me during night time feedings, I'd put her on my chest, prop myself up with pillows and we'd both sleep like that on the sofa.... for weeks! Eventually it went away on it's own, once her system was up and running. It's so sad, isn't it!?

Also, allowing dd to nurse for comfort helped a lot, but sometimes the extra milk would aggrevate her. I started putting a pacifier in her mouth but still holding her to my breast, so she could be comforted by almost not quite nursing....

It will pass, and the medicine won't have long term adverse affects.

[dachshundqueen]

How are you guys doing?

Just looking for an update and hoping that things are going better for you and the babe.

Elizabeth

[cjbeach]

Oh Amy I'm so sorry. Well, let me tell you my experiences with my DS1. He was a horrible horrible refluxer. I was always soaked in spit-up, my hair, my rugs, everything. I remember the doc initially telling me it was a GI virus (at 4 weeks). Not. He wound up aspirating while nursing one morning and after an Upper GI/barium swallow was dx'd with reflux. We did Zantac then eventually added Reglan to it. My doc convinced me he needed to thicken BM if I wanted to keep nursing. I pumped and pumped and tried to thicken and the mess started!!! (I feel like I should label this post "the list of what not to do"... : ) Eventually I couldn't pump anymore for daily feedings and thickenings. So under my doc's advisement I started supplementing with hypoallergenic formula and thickening that. Now my DS was the gassiest little guy I had ever encountered and as a new mom I followed everything my pedi told me to a T. But the pedi never gave us a referral to GI doc so eventually out of disgust at 10 mos I sought out a GI doc. My son literally seemed to never sleep. We had to prop him up to sleep so the most successful trick for us was to have him sleep in his carseat. We did that for the first 4 months of his life. Oh, the GI doc...she switched us over to Good Start formula, I still haven't figured that one out. At 15 mos he was still gassy and spitting... a lot. New GI doc. This doc wanted to do a scope and also felt like he was stool holding (he was-- thank you to thickening formula so early on in his life he was having constipation issues). So we had to start something for constipation. By this point he was off formula but on soy milk. We did 2 weeks of whole milk before the test and he was red, raw, bleeding from profuse diarrhea with the whole milk. The scope biopsy was + for casein allergy (the protein in milk). Back to casein free diet. And life improved...

Ok, child #2. Some colic... nothing special. BF baby.

This baby. Same thing.. aspirated the week before Xmas. Reflux. New doc said "don't stop breastfeeding, it's the best thing for him because it's more protein than anything else and it doesn't have all the crap even hypoallergenic formulas have in them" (I love that he said *crap* ) but if we needed to use Neutramigen hypoallergenic formula thickened with a tsp of rice cereal. Ugh.... what mess when we tried that. I kept thinking "Oh no... here we go again." Soooo this is what we did -- kept nursing, elevated the head of his crib, slept in his carseat if he was especially spitty and instead of Zantac, give him Mylanta twice a day and Mylicon as needed. he still spits but not nearly as much at 13 weeks. As their muscles get stronger in their upper chest... they reflux will improve. It's hard to do belly time with a refluxer but I really think it's necessary to help with improving the muscle development and with gas! I did NOT do belly time a lot iwth DS1 and as a result he was a late crawler. Oh... and if Blake is anything like DS1 I'm expected the spitting which has slightly improved to get worse with teething... Oh and I def cut out DAIRY... big culprit here and soy!

I never found a homeopathic remedy for reflux per se. I think the best thing you can do is to burp her frequently (at least twice a feed) have her sit up for 45 min after. I used Hyland's colic tabs for colic which seemed to work well and the Hyland's teething tabs for teething.

[BelCanto]

Hi,

You might want to look into Chiropractic. I've heard some babies have had a lot of luck with Chiropractic care and reflux.

My children have their first appts. tomorrow. I'm hoping it will help with some sleep issues.

I hope things get better for you all soon.

Best,
Jennifer

[*Amy*]

Thanks for all of your replies. I have to say,it surprised me to learn that there really aren't many alternatives to medications! DD has been on Xantac for about a week now and I've noticed an improvement but she still spits up once or twice a day. The upside is that she doesn't seem to be in pain anymore, so that's a relief.

She had her 2-month well baby check yesterday and I talked to the ped for a long time about xantac and we basically came to the conclusion together to give it a month, and then take her off of it and see how she does. I'm doing this in conjunction with eliminating dairy once and for all (it's hard!! ) and I hope these two things will gradually alleviate the problem. Either that or she'll grow out of it!

As for chiropractic, it isn't covered by our insurance and we don't have an extra $100 per week for it, so that's not an option.

Beachbaby, good lord!! What a nightmare. Poor DS #1!! I hope DS3 doesn't have the same problems! Thanks for sharing your story with me.

[2BoyzMum]

Reflux-us too, I think...

Hi Amy and all, I am taking our 2nd son, 6 week Gianni in to pediatrician tomorrow (Sunday for gosh sakes) as we are finally piecing together that he has reflux. At least I am 95% sure and will see what doc thinks. Arching and pulling off of breast screaming at end of feeding, making a funny gulping sound, crying when he does spit up etc... he dosen't spit up much though. I was wondering same as you. I hate the thought of giving my little breastfed beauty meds at this age. But he isn't happy....will see what doc says tomorrow. I am going to check back here after as you all seem to have some good info. Luckily he is pudgy and doing fine but eating often and not much because he is obviously (now) uncomfortable. Hate this. More soon...