Reflux may show in various ways, it presents different symptoms, is often misdiagnosed as colic, dismissed as your baby just being a ‘fussy eater’ or not even recognised at all.
Most moms do however, instinctively feel that ‘something is not quite right’ and will repeatedly visit the GP or health visitor but end up deeply frustrated feeling it must be something that ‘they are doing wrong’ as no-one seems to listen or understand.
What is reflux and what causes it?
Reflux is simply the ‘backward flow’ of the stomach contents up into the oesophagus.
This is most commonly due to the natural immaturity and weakness of the muscle and valve that lead into the stomach therefore allowing the baby’s feed along with gastric acid to be involuntarily regurgitated.
Most people only recognise reflux if the baby vomits, but this is simply not true and many babies who suffer never vomit.
Quite simply, the force at which the stomach contents come back up determines whether the baby projectile vomits, is frequently sick, continually spits up or is never actually sick, which is known as Silent Reflux. This occurs when the stomach contents continually fluctuate up and down inside the oesophagus causing intense pain with ‘heartburn’ like symptoms – but with no actual vomiting it can be even harder to diagnose as reflux.
What are the typical reflux symptoms?
- Vomiting or spitting up
- Arching the back or neck and body goes rigid
- Irritability and pain
- Frequent hiccups, excessive dribbling
- Gurgling, gagging, choking episodes
- White coating on the tongue [not oral thrush]
- Excessive mucous, sinus congestion
- Raspy/wheezy cough, often worse at night
- Very windy, hard to burp, excessive ‘bottom’ wind
- Excessive feeding or refusal to feed
- Difficult to settle, poor sleep patterns
- Bouts of inconsolable crying
Just to make diagnosis even more difficult, reflux has many different symptoms and individual babies will display different signs of the condition.
Not only are the outward signals determined by the actual root cause and severity of the reflux, but also by the baby’s individual temperament and personality.
For example some will scream with pain whilst others just learn to deal with it and rarely cry, some may be relatively happy although vomit a lot whilst others may refuse feeds, are rarely sick but be quite miserable.
What is the treatment and on-going management for reflux?
Reflux cannot really be ‘cured’ but the symptoms can be controlled, and I always say ‘we have to crack-the-reflux-code’ for each baby to find what helps relieve the individuals’ symptoms”.
There are a range of medical antacid treatments including infant Gaviscon, which by reducing stomach acidity will lessen the burning pain experienced through a reflux attack.
It is also important to understand HOW to maximise the positive effect of finding the right combination of milk and medication.
It is vital to establish a good feeding and sleeping structure as you cannot just medicate a baby and expect everything to fall into place.
The baby may have had weeks or even months of being in discomfort which will have created many negative behavioural associations to feeding and sleeping that will need to be redressed through re-building the baby’s association to milk and food, implementing a daily routine for milk, naps and mealtimes and also you may need to implement some sleep training for night-time.
Although most infants will outgrow reflux as their digestive system matures, many may continue to have problems throughout toddler-hood, but through many years of working with reflux babies, I discovered that there is less likelihood of any long-term negative effects through an early diagnosis, proper treatment and an effective, on-going management plan of the condition.
Weaning a reflux baby
Many parents are told to “wean early” if their baby has been diagnosed with reflux. Whilst this does ultimately help in the majority of cases, firstly, it is imperative to ensure that the reflux, and or, food intolerances and allergies are correctly diagnosed, treated and managed before introducing solids.
Introducing solids to an already distressed digestive system in a baby with untreated reflux can sometimes make matters worse than before.It might induce further vomiting, could create a negative association to solids foods or anything given from a spoon and sometimes even create a complete refusal of solid food.
We also need to be cautious with what is introduced for first foods, as the usual suggested purées of apple or carrot are actually very acidic and often exacerbate an already sensitive gut.
Some babies prove to be intolerant to various different vegetables and fruit; others are sensitive to fish and many to dairy and cows milk protein products. Some are sensitive to other foods containing egg, wheat, soya or gluten!
It can be a minefield when weaning a reflux baby and it is often just through a ‘trial and error’ basis that you can discover which foods suit your baby and those that don’t.
Article Author: By Allison Scott-Wright www.alisonscott-wright.com
For more information on weaning, introducing food groups and how to create delicious, nutritionally balanced meals visit Bumbles Cookery Club http://bumblescookeryclub.co.za/ Be sure to sign up for the monthly newsletter and look out for fun updates. Like Bumbles Cookery Club on Facebook for fun posts, news and information.https://www.facebook.com/bumblesbabies/timeline
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