How Much Spit up Is Too Much???

My son was a spitter too, all day long. I kept a bib on him pretty constantly until his first birthday. He stopped around then. It will probably pass soon. Just keep the bibs and wipes handy.

Both my kids 8yo boy and 11 mo girl did a lot of barfing for the first couple of months (till about 9 months) it would come and go both were and are healthy As long as they are gaining weight it should be fine(0:

welcome to the club! wow glad they diagnosed with "happy spitter" at such an early age. we even were asked to keep a journal of our spitting because our dr. thought we were exaggerating. she did it just like yours - any time, any way, 50 times a day.

our daughter had lots of sketchy tests done - including drinking barium and having x-rays which we really regret now. luckily she was always growing and fine on the weight chart. but i was still worried. until i met a friend who said her son had the same thing. when i saw him - he was a skeleton. no more whining from me!

so what happened? the day she started crawling (10 months old?) she stopped! and i mean to the day! weird. also when she was potty trained, i discovered that her poop didn't look like mine! never noticed in the diaper because i had never changed diapers before! turned out - she's lactose intolerant. so not sure of the connection. but all is well. you just have to carry a change of clothes, lots of wet wipes, and apologize to people when he barfs all over them for no apparent reason.

good luck. i'm sure he'll do fine!

Our son was the same way. Spit up a lot. He was mostly breastfed and only formula when needed. Burping often and keeping him up right after feeding helped a little. He also didn't eat a lot at one time. He just ate often, which exhausted me. Once he started solids it was the same way, throw up a lot. He ate small amounts often. We figured out he has my bad gag reflex and that's what usually caused it with solids. Had to give him small bites. So we were especially careful with chocking foods. He choked a lot. He's 3 1/2 now and every once in a while starts to gag and almost chokes. Not fun. Sounds like your doing what you can. Keep towels, burp rags and wipes handy. ;-)

My daughter went through the same thing. She is now 10 months old and rarely spits up.

It was so bad that not only was I changing her outfit several times a day, but was changing my clothes as well. I even would have to tell family and friends to be prepared with an extra shirt when visiting!!!

My aunt came to visit when she was 3 months old and told meit was not normal and to get it checked out. She, as well as everyone else, scared me to death, but every doctor's visit they told me the same thing...it's fine! She's overeating and her digestive system isn't mature enough to keep it all down.

I know it's really inconvenient, (trust me, I know!), but it will pass in time. My daughter was also a happy spitter and it never seemed to bother her. That's the most important thing to keep in mind. As long as they seem happy, it's nothing to worry about!

You need a BurpieBlocker! Check out www.burpieblocker.com. I had similar issues with my son, which caused me to invent this product for busy moms. It's a cute burp cloth but it has a convenient strap so it doesn't fall off your shoulder. Check it out...use Mama10 for 10% off. Would love your thoughts!

A.

My kids both spit up a lot until almost age one. As long as his weight is fine, don't be worried. When spitup is curdled, that means it's been in the stomach for a while and it starts to curdle in there.

My first baby spit up constantly, typically 3-4 times after each feeding, and all throughout the day. My mom had 7 babies and she said it was completely normal, some babies spit up a lot, some babies a little, some babies none at all, she had them all and they were all breastfed (mine was bottle fed). Since there has been an allergy issue in your family, I would probably keep an eye on it, but as long as he is growing and gaining weight, I don't think you have anything to worry about.

For my son, we would try to keep him upright for at least the first 1/2 hour after feedings, but he had to have time to play on the floor sometime, we just tried to wait at least 1/2 hour after feedings and that helped a little, but he still spit up. We kept towels on the floor and on the couch where we fed him and kept lots of burp cloths around to help with the mess.

I think he is probably just fine. Keep up with the nursing, he would probably do the same thing on formula, that's just the way some babies are. Funny thing, my first baby who spit up all the time, he is now 3-1/2 and every now and then a tiny little bit comes up! It's only happened maybe 3 times in the past 2 years and it is usually associated with him playing hard and rough-housing, but it's kind of a funny thing to me. Also, when he gets a stomach bug, he is usually very quick to vomit. My second baby, who never spit up, is now 2-1/2 and when he gets a stomach bug, he might vomit, but never as much or as readily as his big brother. Sorry if that is TMI, but it's just something I have observed with the sensitivity of their stomachs. But it doesn't seem to be a problem at all.

My little one spit up ALOT when she was an infant. She unfortunately was not a happy spitter and was finally put on prevacid at 6 months. Within a week, she stopped spitting up and literally has not spit up in 5 months now! I am not a proponent of medication unless it is nessecary, and with her, she was not gaining weight and was constantly crying from reflux pain. I hear that they do outgrow it on their own..I am hoping in a month or so to take her off the meds and see if she is any better on her own. I know the spit up is frustrating, gross and can be messy (and even embarrasing in public), but hopefully it will be a thing of the past for you soon! Bring burp cloths and a change of clothes for both of you everywhere you go :)

Coming from the mom of 2 kids that have food allergies - what type of protein was your daughter allergic to? I would try eliminating that food from your diet to see if that solves the problem. Be aware that you must eliminate ALL of the certain food from ALL sources if you really want to look for a change and it may take a full week or more before the protein is out of your body and your milk before you see a difference. My first child later turned out to be allergic to milk protein (amongst other things) but did not react to my breast milk at all. My second I had to eliminate lots of foods from my diet in order to continue breastfeeding because he reacted to it in my milk. (If you want to go this route I am happy to share more about it and offer suggestions/tips that I learned thru the experience. Feel free to contact me!) Janet

All I can say is that my son - 5 mths - is the same way. The doctor isn't worried becase he is growing steadily (though he is considerably smaller than most kids) and he is generally quite happy. It's tough on us because all of us and our floors are always wet and sticky and gross, but from what i hear from mothers who have gone through it before, that's really the worst of it and it will proably ease up once he starts eating solid foods.

So relax, grab a burp cloth or ten, and enjoy the ride.

As long as he's happy and gaining weight, the spit-up is just an inconvenience, I'd say.
(My son projectile-vomited during his first 2 months of life, and it freaked me out completely. My doctor was completely unconcerend because he was gaining weight just fine.)

Are you burping him after every feed? You can also try burping him half way through and then at the end. Burping can take a long time. I would not put him down until you get one to two burps out of him. Hope that helps!

My son had severe reflux when he was an infant and he was breastfed. He would projectile vomit as well. I tried cutting dairy out of my diet, we tried feeding him propt up, and we even tried elevating his crib mattress. None of it seemed to help. We never put him on any medication because he was gaining weight. As he has gotten older it has decreased tremendously. Now as a toddler he hardly ever spits up what he has drank or eaten. Hang in there. It is messy but as long as they are putting on weight they are fine.

R.,

You can try cutting dairy out of your diet. My now 2 year old had serious reflux and once I did an elimination diet and figured out what was bothering him (dairy and soy proteins for him) and cut that out of my diet, he was 90% better and almost all of the spitting up quit. I nursed him until he was 18 months old and I was dairy and soy free that entire time (really not as intimidating as it sounds). At 2 years old, he's still allergic to both dairy and soy but most kids outgrow it at some point. If the culprit is dairy, if you are completely cutting it out (both the obvious dairy stuff and dairy hidden in other foods) you should see improvement i about a week and the improvement will continue for about a month. It takes a long time for dairy proteins to leave your system after you quit eating them. If, after a week, you don't see improvement, you'll need to think about expanding what you are avoiding until you pinpoint the problem. My son was sick so I started out avoiding dairy, soy, eggs, caffeine, chocolate, fish, shellfish, nuts, peanuts, citrus and tomatoes. Once he was okay, I started adding stuff back in one at a time. If he wouldn't have improved, I would have added corn and gluten to my elimination diet. Those are pretty much the most commmon foods to cause problems.

:-)T.

Both of my kids who were breastfed spit up a lot too. My Dr. said, that most often it looks like more than it actually is. I'd say as long as he is gaining weight and overall happy to just keep an eye on it. I don't recall when they stopped but I do remember ALWAYS have a burp cloth on my shoulder to catch it.

Hi R.. Sounds like you are describing my son a few months ago! He was (and still is) breastfed only and spit up just as much as your son is. It was so bad we would never leave the house without burp cloths, even if it was just to go on a short walk. He was also a happy spitter and gaining weight fine. But of course, as a mom, you always worry about things like this. Especially since I felt like I was doing everything possible to improve the condition, including adjusting my diet because of the breastfeeding but nothing did the trick. So long story short...we did nothing. Especially when I got peace of mind from his ped. who assured me this would pass. Around 6 1/2 months is when I noticed it started happening less and less. Now at 9 months it is very rare that he spits up. I'd run it by your ped. but usually as long as they are gaining weight and not in pain, it's something you just wait out. Some peds. do offer a medication which can help (we didn't take it). Trust me, I thought I would never see the day that my son was not spitting up what seemed like half of what was put in! Also, keep up the breastfeeding if you want to-- a lot of people you talk to will blame the spitting up on breastmilk but it usually has more to do with babies sphincter (valve between stomach and esophagus) being immature.

My son had a problem spitting up with breastmilk and formula... it didn't seem to matter and the doctor wasn't concerned because he was healthy and gaining weight. I actually started feeding my son cereal at 3 months old - and eating solid food REALLY helped! By the time he was eating more solid foods at 4 months he wasn't spitting up at all. This might work for your son too.

I would be careful about diet, removing dairy and soy. If you are going to start using formula, here is one that I hear is great as a replacement for soy and dairy. With my daughter, it was eggs that were the main culprit.

Neocate
http://www.neocate.com/aaa_neocate/13888-what-is-neocate....

Please, be very careful about vaccinations as well. If your baby is showing signs of GI problems, ear infections, delay the vaccination schedule until you get more informed. Gardasil for our daughters is also proving to be not what it is advertised and does more harm than good. If you would like more information on a safer way to vaccinate, check out
Dr. Robert Sears, The Vaccine Book and also go to www.mercola.com for information on the Gardasil and other vaccinations.

My son was a "happy spitter" too. I was shocked that he was still gaining weight considering how much he spit up. Our ped said to keep breastfeeding because he would likely spit up just as much with formula. It supposedly peaks at 4 months and is suppose to taper, esp with the introduction of solids. My son kept spitting up quite a bit until about 10 months when it started slowing. Now he's 13 months, was just weaned and eats a lot of table food and just spits a little bit sometimes, esp when he over-eats. The best part is that I'm down to doing laundry only 1/week instead of every other day! Good luck.