Hi,I am Dr. Santosh Kondekar (Pediatrician). I will be looking into your question and guiding you through the process. Please write your question below.
5 Week Breast Feeding Child Passing Smelly, Dark Brownish Stools Along With Wind. Normal?
I have a 5 week old girl. She is breast fed only and occasionally we give her a 4ml dose of a mixture for wind containing Light magnesium , ginger tincture, dill seed oil and peppermint oil. She is passing stools once or twice a day every 3 to 4 days. Her last 2 stools had bits of dark brownish / red mixed in it. These bits are like the size of grains of sand or larger like ground up peppercorns. These stools are very smelly and are accompanied by wind. I spoke to my midwife who said this is normal as the babies digestive system is new. I can t help but worry.
the best thing to do for your 5 week old child is to give her only breast feeds not even a drop of water beyond that.. cause a newborns digestive system is programmed in a way to adapt to mothers milk, mothers milk also has gut maturation factors which will avoid the above mentioned problems in your child.. also it contains enzymes which the baby needs to digest the protein and sugar content of the milk. the milk also contains anti infective agents like antibodies, antibacterials which prevent the harmful bacteria from colonizing the new born gut. these bacteria are responsible for excess gas/ wind production in the bowel.
the best thing is to only breast feed the child 8-10 times daily in interval of 2-2 1/2 hours, watch out for urine output.. normally it needs to pass minimum of 6 times daily.. with this all the problems will stop. In case before you do this baby develops abdominal distension with passing red/brown particle stools then kindly visit a pediatrician as soon as possible.
Hello.
Thanks for writing to us.
A mild change in the stool color in the newborns is normal and happens due to an immature gut and lesser gut flora at the time of birth. Please do not worry. As she will grow, her digestion will become better and this will be alright on its own.
I hope this information has been both informative and helpful for you.
Regards,
Dr. Praveen Tayal
drtayal72@gmail.com
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5 Week Breast Feeding Child Passing Smelly, Dark Brownish Stools Along With Wind. Normal?
hi, the best thing to do for your 5 week old child is to give her only breast feeds not even a drop of water beyond that.. cause a newborns digestive system is programmed in a way to adapt to mothers milk, mothers milk also has gut maturation factors which will avoid the above mentioned problems in your child.. also it contains enzymes which the baby needs to digest the protein and sugar content of the milk. the milk also contains anti infective agents like antibodies, antibacterials which prevent the harmful bacteria from colonizing the new born gut. these bacteria are responsible for excess gas/ wind production in the bowel. the best thing is to only breast feed the child 8-10 times daily in interval of 2-2 1/2 hours, watch out for urine output.. normally it needs to pass minimum of 6 times daily.. with this all the problems will stop. In case before you do this baby develops abdominal distension with passing red/brown particle stools then kindly visit a pediatrician as soon as possible.