Question about poop (xposted in Life with a Babe)

[Lula's Mom]

I have a question about my ds's poop that I wanted to ask here because I figure ECer's see the poop when it comes out, before it gets squished in the diaper.

Ds is 7 weeks old and exclusively breastfed. Up til about 4 weeks he pooped multiple times a day- messy wet mustardy breastmilk poop. Then he went to once a day for a week or so, and then beginning about week 6 he started not going every day.

I'm not really worried about the frequency because I know this can be normal, and it's how it was for my first 2 kids. But I didn't EC them from birth (started at 6 mos with dc #2). So I didn't see their early-weeks poop til it was in the diaper already. What I am wondering about is the consistency of it!

The last two pooping-days have gone like this: 3 days with no poop, lots of tooting, lots of grunting and hard work. When the poops finally arrived, they were small and formed! About the size and shape of my pinky finger. It was not hard at all, but kept its shape in water. (In a diaper it would have squished easily and I wouldn't know about the shape!)

I was really surprised- I thought that breastmilk-only poop was always much more liquid? The first poop like this was followed a few hours later by a bunch of mustardy poop, but so far today's offering has all been formed like this.

So, can anyone tell me- have you seen poop like this from your newborn? Is this in the range of normal? Can a 7-wk-old have formed poop and nothing is wrong? He pees plenty and it's nice and clear, so he's not dehydrated.

Thanks!

[sapphire_chan]

I didn't see formed poop until after solids with Lina, but we had some issues with hindmilk/foremilk balancing. Her first solid poop was what I'd consider to be "classic" breastmilk poop, yellowish, smelled GOOD instead of like vegetable peelings, textured like mustard. It was formed in the water, but was a smeary mess in the potty or diaper. Let me tell you I was quite upset that I hadn't been dealing with that lovely stuff the whole time.

Since you're only seeing it hold it's shape in water and it's soft otherwise, I bet the water is what's making it look firm. Congratulations on having a baby with good poop. : that it continues.

[rissa523]

my daughter didn't start that until about 12 weeks but it has followed in the same manner and still does (she's 16 mo old). Always a solid poop followed by mustard poop. Sometimes she'll go 10 days without pooping and then will poop non-stop for three days. My pediatrician never worried about it, he said bf babies have very personal stool cycles. When I cut gluten out of my daughter's diet she gets far more regular, she's been tested for wheat allergy and isn't allergic. I don't know what the relationship between wheat and regularity is.

[theboysmama]

My dd had that as well. I think you hit it right on when you said that if your child was in a diaper that it would have been mooshed when you changed it. I think that my dd's were very soft and very small but still formed bcs they went strait into the water. They weren't always like that but sometimes. It was way different than her after solids poos that are 2 to 3 x bigger around and very firm.
sounds normal to me