Reflux and Spitting Up

Hi. My daughter is 7 months old and suffered from colic and reflux too. She was on Zantac 1.5 mL. I noticed a huge difference when she started eating solids at around 5 months. There was less spit up. And recently, there is hardly any spit up at all due to her ability to sit up on her own. My pediatrician said this would happen--he said that usually the reflux subsides when the baby can sit up on her own. So, get excited--you're almost there!
By the way, she is also Zantac-free now!!!

my son went through the same thing.
it may take some time, he was 8 months when he could stop taking the medicine. here are some pointers i learned that help; dont lay your baby down right after feeding, try to prop her at a 45 degree angle so she can digest comfertably.
also dont tap and try to burp to vigorously it can make her feel sick and have it all come back up.

also when my son was old enough to eat off a spoon, i gave him a yo baby yogurt everyday and that natrualy helped his tummy/acid get better!!!

good luck

Hi, I am a nurse in a NICu and a lot of our babies have reflux. I can't say when the vomitting will stop but the reflux is NOT meant to stop the vomitting. It is to neutralize her stomach contents so that when she does vomit it will not erode her esophagus. You can ask your ped abput starting reglan which speeds up the digestion process so that the milk/food moves a little fater through her system decreasing her chances of being too full and bringing the food up. You can also try feeding her smaller amounts of milk more frequently. sitting her up for at least 1/2 hour after a feed, and adding some rice cereal to her milk to make it sit on her stomach. Hope this helps!!

Hi, look up all natural cures. You can help w/ out the drugs. Have a great day! Katt

Some babies just spit up a lot. If your baby does have reflux, see a chiroprator that is experienced with children and babies. They produce awesome results with reflux and many other childhood ailments (ear infections especially!) All without the harmful side effects of drugs!!!

J.,

We're going through this with my 5 month old right now, with the only difference being that it doesn't seem to bother him in the least. But he was slipping back down the growth chart (for weight) and so the dr. suggested Zantac and solids. We started thickening his bottle at 3.5 months with rice cereal. I use the Earth's Best organic rice cereal because the "big names" ones like Gerber have barley in them, which can be a big allergen. The EB is only rice. It helps, though he is mostly breastfed so he still has horrible spit ups after he nurses (esp. first thing in the morning). The Zantac seems to help enough that he is gaining weight again, but, like everyone else, we're still doing lots of laundry! We also are on "solid" cereal and veggies every day now-- the ped. said that if he would take them to give them to him because they are calories that he is not likely to spit up.

So, bottom line, if she is not unhappy and she is staying in what ever her height/weight percentiles are, you've just got to ride it out. Good luck!

remember, when your baby spits up it always looks like more than it really is. If your baby isnt crying in discomfort I wouldnt worry about it too much. My daughter has it too. I switched formula to Enfamil AR (added rice)....it's thicker than most formulas, because it comes with rice already in it. After she eats, I wait to change her at least 20 minutes, and keep her propped up , either by holding her or putting her in her 'Boppy'. For the bad taste and burning of the acid, I actually give my daughter Mylanta. The doctor recommended it! I buy the cherry flavored, and she loves it. Since switching to all these methods you wouldnt even know my baby has acid reflux anymore.

My 2nd baby had reflux and he took Zantac. I thought it was to keep him from having reflux. It didn't work at all and my pediatrician explained that the Zantac won't stop him from spitting up, but it will help it to stop burning. One day I just stopped giving him the meds since I wasn't thrilled about him being on them. He still spit up, but he didn't cry. The reflux didn't seem to bother him, so I just always took extra outfits and a Shout Wipe for me and went with it. He did this until about 9 months and then eventually he got better. It did get a little better when I introduced solids around 6/7 months. Good luck!

The zantac wont stop her from spitting up, the Zantac just makes it hurt less... it blocks the acid, to keep it from damaging the esophagus. If shes still in pain, you could ask for a PPI like Prilosec (and a referral to a Ped GI and/or some tests to rule out anatomical abnormalities), but if its just a matter of her spitting up, then you just basically have to wait it out.. prop the head of her crib up, and try to keep her upright during and after feedings... sometimes they suggest adding rice cereal to the bottles to help weigh down the formula. If shes gaining weight though, they wont do much more than that. My son is 10mo old now and is on a high dose of both Prilosec and Zantac and still suffers from the burning sometimes. Most kids outgrow it around a year, supposedly, so I'm hoping that happens for us, and for you too!

Also, if you go to this site, they have GREAT info and very helpful forums on the issue: www.infantrefluxdisease.com

My daughter had acid reflux and was put on Zantac as well. Our pediatrician recommended using Enfamil Lipil AR which is specifically designed for babies who spit up frequently. It is thickened with rice starch which helps keep the formula down once she drinks it. I found this formula to be extremely helpful in reducing how much she spit up. As she became older and was spitting up less, I decided to stop giving her the Zantac for a week to see what happened (around 4 months) and she seemed fine. So I stopped giving her the Zantac for good. She is 7 months now and doing great. I found that once we started giving her rice cereal, oatmeal, and other baby food (around 5.5 months) that the spitting up seemed to decrease even more. So hang in there, it gets better, but I would definitely try the LIPIL AR.

Dear Jen,
I am so sorry to hear about your son's reflux and your concerns. My son had reflux and his screams and cries were so heartwrenching. I didn't know what was wrong until one day after nursing he was having some belly time while I folded laundry and he started crying, fussing, and yelling and he spit-up and it was pink with blood. We wnt to his pediatrician and he said reflux.

What I found helped him (and me) were: we propped my son up after every feeding for at least an hour (he spent most of his first year in the bouncy seat, being carried or held upright, or in his stroller), I put a wedge in his bed and raised his mattress on one end to angle the bed so his head was higher than his feet, he began eating at 4 months - a small amount of ceareal then nursing or a bottle and then finish up with more cereal, when he bagan to eat we did the same thing some solids before liquids, and smaller more frequent feedings. By 6 months, my son had stopped spitting up everyday and he did not have any food allergies or swallowing issues.

I was worried about autism, as food aversion and spitting up and disturbed sleep was an indicator for a friend of mine but my pediatrician and I spoke and watched my son's development and he was making eye contact, responding to his name, and interacting while meeting all of his other bench-marks. My son has been below the 25th percentile for weight but it was consistant through his development(3 years now) so my pediatrician told me not to worry.

As for the medication, my son has never been on medication for his reflux because my peditrician and I wanted to try other interventions like the propping, solids, and smaller meals, before introducing medication. I would talk with your pediatrician and ask your questions about the concerns for his esophagus and the Zantac.

Stay strong! It does pass and my son remembers nothing of it and eats a wide variety of foods and textures.

Both of my kids were reflux babies. My son was on Zantac for almost 10 months and my daughter on Prilosec for 4. They were also on Nutramigen formula for colic. From what I have learned, the medicine is there to help with the reflux but it will not stop it 100%. For my son, it helped him with the awful burning he would get when he would try and eat. My guess is that it neutralized the acids so that when he did reflux, it wasn't causing him tremendous pain. As your daughter gets older and has more control of her body - sitting up specifically - you will see a decrease in theh spitting up. There is a flap in their esophagus (sorry, I don't know all the medical gargon) that is weak and causes the spit up - instead of closing, it stays open or flaps open and that allows the formula to reflux back up. As a baby learns to sit unassisted, it builds their muscles which strenghten that flap and it stays closed. Again, not very technical but that's the gist of it. The medicine is there to help the reflux but it won't eliminate it completely - their bodies have to mature for that to happen. It just takes time but she will outgrow it. Hang in there - I know it's frustrating and messy.

I have twin girls and both have reflux. We were on Zantac for a while and that did help with the arching and discomfort (it is supposed to "repair" their esophagus as well as cut down on the acid but won't stop anything). I know how stressful it can be to see your baby eat 4 oz and then appear to spit up 2 oz, but as long as she is gaining weight you are doing well. Both of my girls switched to prevacid solutabs. I dissolve the tablet in some water and then give it to them via a syringe. That has worked wonders. Typically reflux will go away around 8 months or so, if not sooner. My girls are a year and the only time I smell or see acid (actual clear acid, the milk spit ups were WAY down when they were 6-7 months) is when they are giggling too much and give themselves hiccups or they didn't get enough of a nap. However, my situation may be a bit different, my girls were preemies.

I'd ask your doctor about the prevacid and then give it a few more months. All of a sudden you'll realize the spit ups are fewer, especially when you start giving your daughter cereal. Good luck!