My son is almost 4 months old. He used to have a bowel movement every other day or so but for the past month his system has completely changed. He has gone 6 days without a movement. First the doctors recommended gycerin suppositories, which worked the first time but did not work subsequent times. Then we started with 2 ounces of prune juice a day, again worked and then stopped working. We tried baby laxative drops once, they worked, but not something I want to keep doing. Now we are doing 1ml of Maalox every 4 hours. He hasn't pooped in almost 6 days and I am at a loss. The doctors seem to have nothing to say. They say that he isn't technically constipated if the stool is soft, even if it is only once a week. He is strictly breastfed and I am wondering if anyone else has had this experience or has any info for me.
My son is 3 1/2 months and strictly breastfed. He has gone 5 days in a row without pooping. My dr. wasn't too worried either. I found that gently inserting a rectal thermometer with lots of vaseline helps. I do it a few times a day and that usually works. Also, a warm bath helps him. Maybe it relaxes all the muscles. My dr. said that breastfed babies don't go every day because there's less waste with breast milk as opposed to formula.
Both my sons went through a non-pooping stage between 2 and 4 months. My Dr. said that breast milk is the perfect food and newborns use every bit of it so there is no waste for them to expel. We figured that if they gained weight and the doctor wasn't too concerned, then we wouldn't be either. Good Luck!
Breastfed babies do not get constipated. Breastmilk is the perfect food and so easily digestible. I really wish the pediatricians knew what they were talking about with regard to this but they still treat breastfed babies like formula fed babies. They just don't know! The babies can definitely go a long time without pooping, even though it seems strange to us adults. A great resource for you would be kellymom.com. Look this up on there and you will get some more information on this topic. I exclusively breastfed my dd, now 5 years old, and my ds, now 9 months old. We had the same issue with my ds and he now at his age will still skip a few days without pooping but he went through the same thing around your baby's age...going a full week without pooping. I refused to do the suppositories or water or prune juice. One thing I did try was to give him a warm bath and he did poop right in the bath.
Hi. I am a mom of 3. My son was my first and he was exclusively breastfed for the first year.
When he was about 4 months old he went 11 days straight with no bowel movement. I called the doctor about every 2 days and took him to see them a couple of times, but because he was happy and wasn't straining and crying to poop they said he was fine. They said he will go, but, obviously, if things change and he starts to complain or strain to bring him back. He finally went on the 12th day. He is 10 now and very regular. All will be well. Good Luck.
