Argh.

[rivka]

Colin had his six-month well-baby visit today.

His head circumference percentile has increased from 95% to more like 98-99%. His pediatrician recommends another consult with the neurosurgeon.

His weight, on the other hand, has dropped one line on the growth chart. Ped says, not uncommon in an exclusively-breastfed baby between 4 and 6 months.

He wants us to work on getting solids into Colin and consider supplementation. We're to have a measurement follow-up in six weeks. I stopped by Whole Foods on the way home and picked up some oatmeal and some fenugreek capsules to augment my milk supply. If that doesn't work over the next six weeks, we'll argue about whether I should supplement with formula then.

I've been having trouble keeping up with the pumping lately, so it doesn't seem farfetched that I might be having supply issues. (I had been wondering if the pump, which I bought used, was wearing out.) We'll see what a couple weeks of fenugreek does for me.

I really didn't need this when I was already incredibly stressed out.

Comments

[marydell.livejournal.com]

Hugs. I hope everything works out without you having to make too many changes.

(In case you didn't see my comment on the other post, rice cereal mixed with water is an alternative to mixing with breast milk--my food-sensitive baby does fine with that)

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I did think of that, but mixing with water would nearly halve the calorie count. 4 Tbsp brown rice cereal made with water = 50 calories. Mixed with 2 ounces of breastmilk, it's 94 calories.

(What a great Charlie icon!)

[marydell.livejournal.com]

Ah, dang, I didn't realize that. (Charlie's been a little porker from the get-go, so our task has been not to overfeed him). And doubling up on the rice quantity would lead to sadness, since it's a binder.

Your Colin icon is great, too! Such an alert little cutie pie.

[kalmn.livejournal.com]

*hug*

that's hard.

[fairoriana.livejournal.com]

Oh argh indeed. How very stressful!

Are you getting enough to eat? Is the stress suppressing your appetite? Would you like me to ship you my fairly new, no longer being used pump?

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Hugs/comfort offered - Colin's almost certainly fine, but I can imagine it's pretty nerve-wracking.

[eeyorerin]

Oh argh. That sounds difficult.

[ratphooey.livejournal.com]

Have you used fenugreek before? It gave me truly terrible stomach cramps and associated unpleasant experiences. YMMV.

[kate_nepveu]

Arrrgh indeed. Sympathies.

[chargirlgenius.livejournal.com]

I have been there. My sympathies. Edward went three months with no weight gain, believe it or not by looking at him now. *hugs*

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

Is the pediatrician using the WHO breastfeeding baby growth charts? I'd like to think most are these days, but it's still worth asking, especially since that IS the normal pattern of growth for a breastfed baby compared to a formula-fed baby. They tend to grow faster during the first 4 to 8 months and level off afterwards, while formula-fed babies are more of a steady curve.

Of course, you might be having legitimate supply problems, but be sure the pediatrician is using current, accurate information before blaming yourself.

http://www.who.int/childgrowth/standards/cht_wfa_boys_p_0_2.pdf
http://www.who.int/childgrowth/standards/en/ (includes information about methodology)

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Yes, Colin has dropped on both charts, and we've noticed recently that his wet diapers aren't as heavy as we might have expected. Between those things and the fact that I'm struggling to keep up with pumping, I think that supply problems are a legitimate diagnosis.

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

Makes sense, though I'm sorry it isn't such a benign answer! I know supply can be very hard to maintain while pumping.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I heard it was chocolate and sushi and zucchini bread that you were supposed to eat to increase milk value. Oh, and ice-cream, but it has to be the whole-cream kind, not sorbet or frozen yoghurt.

[jerusha.livejournal.com]

I don't know anything about what it would do to your milk supply, but that all sounds like much more fun than fenugreek capsules! (And, depending on frequency of application, might help with stress as well... mmm, chocolate.) Chocolate chocolate-chip zucchini bread? With a scoop of ice-cream on top? One serving po bid; refill ad lib.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I also got some cherry-pomegranate toaster pastries. :-)

And yes, we have ice cream, the full-fat kind, and in this hot weather I've been eating some every day. Got to keep my calcium levels up, you know.

[aloha-moira.livejournal.com]

Ick, I'm sorry. Hope everything works out okay. (And I second the recommendation of chocolate and ice cream over fenugreek.)

[jerusha.livejournal.com]

OK, obviously my mental visualizer is out of whack. I just pictured a sprig of greenery topped with ice cream and chocolate syrup.

Either that, or I'm just hungry :)

[aloha-moira.livejournal.com]

Hahaha! No - definitely my sentence generator that's out of whack - your reading is perfectly valid. And slightly disturbing. ;)

[puzzlement.livejournal.com]

Argh indeed, a pile-on of things you don't need even when not stressed out.

Good luck clearing what you can off the pile and I hope before long you're piled with heavy babies and other good things medical and not.

[castiron.livejournal.com]

Good luck! (I like eating extensive amounts of Indian food as a way to get more fenugreek into my system, but mileage varies....)

My younger son fell off his growth curve around 6 months, though in his case I think it was more due to various colds etc. that made eating unpleasant; it didn't help that my milk supply also dropped then, though!

[ailbhe]

Oh, dear. Oatmeal and fenugreek and perhaps locking L in a cellar for a month or so, I guess, just in case it *is* a supply issue.

Of course, after 6 months, supplementing breastmilk with other foods is *normal* behaviour, and why some of the other foods shouldn't be formula milk I can't imagine. I wonder would cereal made with formula instead of human or cow's milk work, to maximise nutrition with minimal cost to you?

[riarambles.livejournal.com]

That's what we're doing. I somehow (illogically!) feel better about mixing cereal with formula than I do about giving a bottle of formula.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Of course, after 6 months, supplementing breastmilk with other foods is *normal* behaviour, and why some of the other foods shouldn't be formula milk I can't imagine.

They're going to take away your lactivist card for this, you know. In the first place, you're supposed to tell me that he can only have TASTES of solid food for most of the first year. In the second place, formula starts with an "F" because it means FAILURE.

(And yes, I could mix cereal with formula, and I even have a can of formula because my hospital violates the WHO guidelines and sends a starter can home with every breastfeeding mother. But I am hoping to avoid that.)

[tammylc.livejournal.com]

Take away my lactivist card too, but the formula for cereal is what i was thinking too. Since solids are already in play, it's not like there's "virgin gut" to worry about, which is one of the typical arguments against formula supplementation.

I'm sorry you're having to go through all this, and especially right now, when you have so many stressors in your life.

FWIW, which may not be anything at all, when I look back at my nursing experience with Liam, I wonder if I should have supplemented. I had terrible supply problems and it was stressful and nervewracking trying to keep up. When he finally really got into solids he gained 4 lbs in a month and went from 50th percentile to 70th percentile very quickly, so I wonder if I was underfeeding him all that time, and if we wouldn't have all been happier if I'd just sent a couple bottles of formula to daycare. But at the time it was literally inconceivable to me that I would do that - it didn't occur to me until at least a year later that it was a) an option and b) might have been a good idea.

Much hugs and sympathy.

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

[sarcasm]

After you feed him the formula, you should vacuum the remaining sparkles off him. Just to make sure that no AP grandma mistakes him for an appropriate mate for her grandbaby.

Not that there's probably many sparkles left, what with the (insert ridiculous thing here). [/sarcasm]

On a less sarcastic note, ignore Alegna and do what you gotta do. Formula in cereal sounds like a sanity-saving measure and a sensible compromise.

Or you could try him on mushed up avocados or something.

[ailbhe]

In my experience, babies will only TAKE tastes of non-milk foods until they are ready. Linnea self-fed with a spoon before 17 weeks, and made the switch from mainly-milk to mainly-nonmilk about six months when she was cruising round the furniture and learning to climb stairs and so on, and Emer didn't make the same switch until much closer to a year, again when she was cruising round the furniture and getting ready to walk.

My main lactivism is that mothers should have an honest chance to make their own choice, without being set up for breastfeeding failure from the word go. My training focussed on that. Using lactivism to further disempower vulnerable women makes me sick, which is why I stayed in the boob nazis community for so long.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

Can I be your moderate-lactivist advocacy twin? You sound shiny and sane. :->

-- still exclusively breastfeeding at week 28. She shows some very mild enthusiasm for tastes of food, evinces great enthusiasm for shoving anything we put in our mouths in her mouth (though she was v. nonplussed to dump a cup of water over herself the one time we let her TRY, in the bathroom, instead of being Big Meanie Meaniepants and taking the glasses of ice water away from her).

[ailbhe]

I'm not all that moderate - I'd like to see formula advertising wholly illegal and the moneymaking scam that is follow-on milk burnt at the stake. But I'm sane enough to know that formula sometimes saves lives, though perhaps not as many as breastfeeding does, globally, and to recognise when food is food.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

My husband's antipathy to formula was cemented by reading the ingredient list and realizing if it were sold as a food for adults he'd personally reject it on the 'eew, look what's IN it' grounds.

[ailbhe]

It's less likely to make a baby sick than cows' milk, goats' milk, sheeps' milk, or the many honey-and-soy-and-oats concoctions for which recipes abound on the hippie internet.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know. He's just got a bee in his bonnet about processed foods and the evils thereunto appertaining; me personally, I think a certain level of 'processed' is unavoidable if you want the convenience of long shelf-life, ease of reconstitution anywhere, specifically-engineered nutritional completeness, etc etc.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Honey for a baby under a year?!

[ailbhe]

Do *not* google "make your own formula milk" or anything similar. Really, really not.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

That kind of reasoning leads people to make their own makeshif formulas out of things like raw goat's milk. Curiously enough, the scientifically balanced ones turn out to be more complete.

(Also, this thread is coming perilously close to formula bashing, which I am not willing to host.)

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

What a barrage of stressful things!

Aside from the oatmeal and the fenugreek, are you sure you're getting enough water? It's been very hot here, I imagine hotter there, and dehydration will cause supply problems. If so, it's an easy fix, which is why I mention it.

I hope that all things are better soon.

[shandra.livejournal.com]

I found even de-alcoholized beer would increase my supply quickly - like within 8 hours (I didn't experiment with real beer) - I'm sure there are other sources of yeast that would work but I couldn't argue with the delivery system.

I also found, but here was the luxury of the Canadian system, a day in bed helped too. Is there any way you can spend Saturday in bed with the baby and loads of water and some books or dvds and have Alex with Michael or someone else, just for a sheer break?

Of course the head measurements are worrying but that isn't a huge percentile leap to me - like not from 25 to 65 or something. So hopefully it's just a precaution.

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

I got no advice - just more *hugs*.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Not sure I can offer anything other than good thoughts and *hugs*, but I do hope you feel less stressed soon.

[laurarey.livejournal.com]

I did the fenugreek and Blessed Thistle combo and had good results. The only problem I had was that I think it increased my estrogen levels a bit. (My face broke out for goodness sake as did Rachel's.)

Sending good thoughts to you and Colin!

Pumping...

[tendyl.livejournal.com]

If you need, I have two pumps - you could borrow one or the other as I'm certainly not using them right now.

*hug* Good luck figuring it all out.