Happy baby boy but refuses eating

My twins are 4.5 months. They started reconigize the world around them like 1.5 months ago. But recently, my son is getting excited and excited about eveyrthing around him. He is so busy to figure out everything. he is the most happy baby I've ever seen. Well I didnt see many. they are my first haha. He laughs and talks to even his crib mobile. he tries to have 'a conversation' with every body in the house. I should be happy about him. But I am worried because he refuses to eat. At feeding, he keeps talking and smiling. He shakes his bottle out, pulls my hand off, or hit his bottles off. I try everything. BUt nothing works. Right now, we just try to feed him when he's asleep. Then he eats alot. When hes awake, its so so hard to feed him. He used to eat like 24-28oz/day. The past 2 weeks, he only eats like 20-24oz. He used to sleep through night for a month. But now, he wakes up some time for food. The past couple nights, I woke up checked on them. I saw he was sucking his thumb. I gave him a bottle. He sucked down 4 oz in like 10 mins. I really dont want he eats at night. But he refuses bottles in the day and doesnt get enough nutrition. He stops gaining weight for more than a week too. So I have to feed him at night again. He has thrush, but its not that bad to disturb his feeding (his pedi said so), he doesnt have ear infection. Hes always happy. I dont think anything bothers him. I dont know what to do with him anymore. Do you experience this? If do what you do. Please help me.

 

I'm dealing with this, too! Here's what works for us: pick a quiet, dark location for feedings so that they aren't so distracted and decrease the time between daytime feedings.

 

I agree with pp. He does seem distracted! LOL! When feeding just try to do it somewhere quiet with as little distraction as possible. Glad he is a happy baby though!

 

Yep, time to feed him somewhere else. I did a lot of nursing and bottles in the nursery with the shades drawn and the door shut.

 

Oh man I can TOTALLY relate to this. My boys both just stopped wanting to eat. It's like their appetites just disapeared and it was a HUGE struggle to get them to eat. This lasted from about 2 months to about 6 months.

What I found helpful was when they woke up I would have them play for an hour or so to ware them down and then feed them since, like you, they ate better once they've worked off some energy. It was still a struggle, don't get me wrong, and I had to feed them while they cried and screamed and seemly just refused to eat. Once they calmed down and got a bit sleepy they would eat. The process took about an hour to get 4-6oz into them every 4 hours. It was extremely stressful and we ended up doing some pretty invasive procedures at the advice of our GI specialist. I kid you not, the moment that test was over they started sucking down 8oz bottles in 10 minutes per baby and I could do it first thing in the morning without having to have them "work-up" an appetite.

Hang in there Momma, it will get better. In the meantime just breath and try and remain as calm as you can. I know it's frustrating because you want them to eat because you are afraid they aren't getting enough to eat but despite our troubles our boys always gained weight at every well check-up and are 12months and 21lbs.

 

Yep.. quiet location! I have two social kids who needed to check out EVERYTHING :headbang: while feeding. Quiet locations work well!

 

TOTALLY agree with this. I could have NO distractions while I was feeding, no phone calls, no one could enter the nursery because it even the slightest stimulate entered the nursery room they would immediately stop eating and I could not get them to restart. I went as far as shutting the door during feedings and taking the phone off the hook so they wouldn't get distracted during the feed. If someone entered the nursery while I was feeding I would bite their heads off!

 

Thanks ladies! I did put him in a quite dark room yesterday. BUt still did not work out. He calmed down, but as soon as I put bottle in his mouth, he cried. Finally, I let him cry in the room for like 5 minutes. He got tired and fell asleep. Then I could gave him 2 oz. From 4:30 to 10, he took like 4 oz. Last night, I had to get up give him 2 bottles and he took everything (so yesterday total was like 22oz). His morning, he woke up like 7, refused bottle again. Then we wrapped him up in his crib. He fell asleep at 8, then took his bottle. Man I have no freaking idea how to deal with him. I have to work full time. I am so exhausted. I look like zonbi these days.
Should I add some cereal into his bottles or something. I weigh him everyday. Some days he loses 1 oz, then gains back 1 oz. It has been like this for like 2 weeks.

btw, we brought him in. His pedi said hes totally fine. And she thought its weird that he only eats when hes asleep. She suggested we work with him. HOW?????

 

Crying at the bottle and night eating can also be a sign of reflux. Does he arch his back, too? I know you said he's happy and that your pedi said he's fine, but I'd keep pushing for more answers and assistance from your ped until you get to the bottom of this situation and find a rhythm that works for you. Good luck - I'm so sorry and I know how frustrating and fatiguing it can be.

 

his sis has a bad reflux.he has it but not bad.however, he is on zantac.and hid doc increased dose already.I have been pushing the doc. But she doesn't care much because he doesn't lose weight.she suggested couple things. We tried but still not working

 

Ok here's what happened with my two, if my memory is working properly...lol, both my boys exhibited ALL of the signs of severe reflux. They were first on zantac and that didn't work so we went to prevacid, still no change. The boys would still projectile vomit up to three feet at EVERY feeding. They also just refused to eat almost as if they just didn't care about food at all because they could go HOURS between bottles and be fine. Surprisingly they still gained weight.

I on the other hand was at my wits end with all of this constant screaming and fighting to get them to eat and the constant projectile vomitting that was occurring daily/nightly.

I begged and begged and finally we were sent to a GI specialist. They basically said "Yep, sounds like reflux, keep using the Prevacid but try more hypo allergenic formulas, add rice cereal (beechnut is hands down WAY better than Gerber IMO). So we went home tried them on Soy, the hypo allergenic formula sold in stores and then into a SUPER expensive ULTRA hypo allergenic formula only available via phone from the manufacturer. The GI specialist assumed this may be a severe milk protein allergy so we eliminated anything that had milk protein in it....no change.

From the moment we started with the GI specialists they kept suggesting that a probe study be done where they go in through the mouth with a scope to check for any problems or reflux and then a 24 monitoring of feedings with the probe still down into their throat through their noses. When we fed them if they displayed any of the things that were going on at home, the crying, screaming, etc. we would push a button so that the Nurses and Doctors could monitor what was happening.

Turns out....NO REFLUX and NO MILK PROTEIN ALLERGY. This basically meant, well we don't have any medical reason why your children are refusing to eat and throwing up so we are going to refer you to a feeding specialist.

I kid you not, within a week or two of coming home from that overnighter at the Children's hospital the boys just started to want to eat again, like I've never seen before. I mean, we used to have to get the to the point of sleep to feed or just hold the bottle in their mouth while they were screaming and hold them down until it stopped so they would eat. Now all of the sudden the feedings that used to take over 40min per baby took a total of 15 minutes for both and that includes prep time, and those are with 8oz bottles.

We never went to the feeding specialist because they didn't need it. Suddenly they just started eating normally. No milk allergy, no reflux, nothing.

It's no wonder the medications to control reflux never worked for us...they never had reflux to begin with.

 

Have you tried asking if you can switch to Prevacid? Zantac did nothing for my boys reflux. Once we got them on Prevacid they were new babies. I would investigate further. FWIW, even if they are gaining weight they can still have severe enough reflux that is painful and needs to be treated. Mine were above average on the charts once they hit them and our Ped never said not to treat if they were gaining well.