What is the reason for baby spitting up milk?

Generally, the gastrointestinal function of babies within three months is not fully developed, so it is normal for them to spit up milk. To improve this problem, you must first adopt the correct feeding posture and burp the baby in time after feeding to ensure that the gas is discharged. When parents find that the baby spit up milk curds or milk lumps, they should consider indigestion or gastrointestinal problems and need to check in time.

Spitting up symptoms:

Within 3 months, the baby's stomach is in a horizontal position, making it easy to store milk. Moreover, the stomach capacity is very small. The baby's stomach can only hold 12 taels of milk in more than 10 days after birth. Even with this 12 taels of milk, it takes about 23 hours to empty the stomach, so it is more reasonable to feed once every 3 hours or so. If the baby is fed too frequently, it will inevitably affect the amount of milk taken in at the next meal or cause stomach bloating. Some of the milk taken in at the previous meal will remain in the stomach and, combined with stomach acid, may cause milk lumps to be vomited out.

Solution:

Use feeding positions that control milk flow

Some new mothers like to breastfeed while lying down. This face-to-face side-lying breastfeeding posture will increase the possibility of the baby spitting up milk. If the baby is held, his body is tilted. When the baby's body is tilted at about 45 degrees, the lower opening of the stomach will have a certain tilt accordingly. The inhaled milk can partially flow into the small intestine due to gravity, making part of the stomach empty. Therefore, you can hold the baby up when feeding and let him lie in your arms with his head facing up. The new mother can support the baby's back with one hand in a scissors shape, and use the thumb and other four fingers of the other hand to place the upper and lower parts of the breast to support the entire breast for feeding. When the milk flow is fast, you can pinch the breast with the thumb and index finger to control the milk flow rate.

1. Burping

After the baby finishes drinking milk, since the lower part of the stomach is filled with milk and the upper part is filled with air, it will cause stomach pressure, resulting in milk overflowing and vomiting. Therefore, you should burp your baby in time to let the gas out. As long as the pressure in the stomach is reduced, vomiting and regurgitation of milk can naturally be alleviated.

2. Postural therapy

If burping is difficult, hold your baby upright and let him lie on your shoulder for at least 30 minutes. Then raise the pillow and let your baby lie on his right side. This can effectively increase the speed of stomach emptying.

3. Diet therapy

Increase the number of feedings, reduce the amount of milk each time, and feed small meals frequently. Holding your baby for a while after feeding instead of laying him flat in the crib can help reduce reflux. However, milk that is too thick can easily cause gastrointestinal obstruction or diarrhea.

4. Medication

If the vomiting and regurgitation are severe, ask your doctor to prescribe some medication to stimulate gastrointestinal motility to improve the situation. However, drug treatment is considered last.

Tips

When your baby spit up milk and has a fever, cough, or diarrhea or abdominal pain, you should consider whether your baby has an infectious disease.

Common infectious diseases include colds, pneumonia, enteritis and other diseases. When babies have a cold, they often vomit due to coughing. You should be especially careful when feeding at this time, because a cold and cough will increase the breathing rate, leading to spitting up and regurgitation of milk, so you should pay attention to the coordination of breathing and swallowing when feeding, and try to "feed in small amounts and frequently".