Constipation in Babies

[lvrofmusik]

I have a beautiful 51/2 month old baby girl, who has just started solids regularly for a week-two weeks, she is constipated I have tried giving her prunes and giving her some apple juice, can you guys recommend anything natural that I can do to help move her bowels a bit? I would appreciate any advice, thanks so much... :D

Cheri

[JRBL]

Does she seem like she is uncomfortable or in pain? My younger twin, Cally, goes less often than her older twin, Holly; in fact she goes so much less that I was worried she was constipated but, she doesn't have any symptoms of constipation, i.e. straining, hard stool, fussiness when going, that kind of thing.

She has a good day's worth of going and then she's good for a few days, she never seems uncomfortable or anything.


I just took it that she just doesn't go as often as others. My oldest was the same way... I dunno... but natural "remedies" for constipation... you pretty much named it... lots of fiber, applesauce, nix bananas, give her some pears, veggies that are packed with fiber. Let us know how you get on. :)

[lvrofmusik]

She is constipated, she has hard stools and you can tell while she is trying to poop, she strains pretty hard. I had heard someone tell me that castor oil helped their baby, but I don't know how safe, I don't want her bowels to depend on anything to get moving, I wouldn't be too worried but it has been over two weeks since she has had a really good bowel movement, she goes several times a day but it's hard and small.

Thanks for sharing your experiences.
Cheri :)

[love2bmom]

I would watch the apple juice that can be a little rough on the digestive system. Try prunes and maybe call the ped. Two weeks is a long time to go without a bm.

[mom n luv]

My little one has major constipations issues, we were to the point that his poos were getting stuck YIKES the doctor gave me some tips and said if these don't work we are going to use meds and I didn't want that so here are all of the things we did. We still have to be qute vigilant but have not had to have meds yet.
Cut out cereal completely for 2 months.
Pear juice much easier on the stomach than others up to 4 ounces a day.
Lots of squash, sweet potatoes, and pears. My ped didn't suggest prunes but I did use them some.
1 teaspoon of dark karo syrup in the bottles. My ds didn't always have a bottle so sometimes I mixed it in his cereal when we were giving it to him. Some DR.'s say that karo syrup can conain botulism but my ped said that recent research has said that it is safe for our little ones.
And under severe times of distress we took his rectal temperature and that seemed to help him push it out.

I know that my little ones problems are primarily link to cereal and soy formula. I hope that you can solve your little ones problems.

[jen1981]

The dark Karo syrup works very well. My cousin's baby has been con. since she was born and it works wonders. It is very easy on their little tummies too.

[MomFromCanada]

My dd did and still does have difficulty in this area. For a while we were giving her prunes and now she does not want to eat them anymore so we give her prune juice. She seems to like it and it helps her a lot. Otherwise we have cut back on her milk/dairy consumption too, that may have helped a bit also.

[lvrofmusik]

Thanks so much for your advice I think I will definitely try the karo syrup. I don't want meds either, I think they can make your body dependent on them, and since I have problems in this area myself, I don't want her to experience the same things I have. Thanks for all your advice, I will let you know if it works... [hug] This is the first time I have posted a topic, I appreciate all the response, it feels so good to have people you can turn to who share the same beliefs you do. Thanks a bunch again.

Cheri :)

[buttercup_97140]

I would say for you, the adult, try Kefir...works wonders, and when your Dd gets older, give her some too, it fixed my chronically constipated Dd for good.
As for Dd, I had to resort to giving her glycerin rectally once a week or so for her to go at all. We tried all those oral treatments, but nothing worked. I do not think glycerin is habit forming, but honestly it worked so well until we could give her kefir we didn't worry too much about it. Sounds bad I know. I think it causes the bowels to "cramp" and therefore cause a BM.
I have a friend who does most everything with herbs, and she made a solution of catnip tea with garlic in it and she would give that to her baby rectally and it would make her baby go, help hydrate her baby a bit, and also give a boost to the baby's immune system, but it didn't work for Dd. She just smelled like garlic...LOL!
If you do try glycerin just know that your Dd will go VERY quickly after you administer it. My Dd would lay on me, get a bit sweaty, and then go. She would be a brand new baby afterwards.

I do not reccommend this as a first try thing, so please know that I think it's very wise to try all the different high fiber foods first, but this is an option if all else fails yet you don't want to go to meds. I bought a bottle of liquid glycerin because the baby gycerin enemas were getting expensive.

I pray you find something that works for your little one. It's so hard to watch our babies in pain.

Amber

p.s. I just did a little "research" on the glycerin, and I didn't find anything that talked about it causing dependency because it only works on the very end of the digestive tract.

[lvrofmusik]

Thanks for all the advice, I tried the dark karo syrup, in fact just a tiny bit with some pear juice mixed with equal amounts of water, and she has been twice today, those good ones where she gets it everywhere. I was so excited. :) Thanks so much for all the advice. I had a very blessed day today, I hope you all did. :)

Cheri :wink:

[jen1981]

I'm so glad she is doing better! Hallelujah! :D

[4Angelz]

:) Glad she's doing better. Oh yeah, with all three of my children, rice cereal and apples would constipate them tremendously. I only use the barley cereal... keeps them regular! :wink:

[breezykc2]

1tsp. dark molassis to one 10 ounce bottle a day.....

[mhall]

Karo works great! I used it when my babies were all very little.

[Jens2Boys]

My son was like this. We had to give him suppositories. I know, not pretty, but they worked. Poor guy was the only one with suppositories in his cubby at daycare. But, they did work.

[magk8ball]

i know your troubles, and it sounds like you are getting very good advice. my dd #1 went through this for almost 2 years, and we finally had to put her on a glycerin based laxative at just over a year old, which she is off of now, but that's beside the point. the other thing, if you are feeding your daughter rice cereal, switch to oatmeal. oatmeal is higher in fiber, and rice can actually contribute to the constipation.

anyway.. that's my two bits :p

[Lisha71106]

Lexi used to get really constipated when we first started solids, it was bad, she would just cry and cry, and sit in my lap with her knees drawn up to her tummy like a little frog and just push and push. It was so sad!

She really liked prunes but then started to hate them, so we started giving her prunes w/pears, and she really liked that. We've also done the karo and water, and it worked unless she was really really constipated. Now for some reason, all I have to do is give her meat (she LOVES chicken! ) and she'll poop. Massaging her tummy, starting under her bellybutton then to right under her ribs, and going clockwise (don't go counter clockwise, it will actually make her more constipated) really helped. We also did a lot of "wheels on the bus" too.

I would switch to oatmeal too.