Baby cramps are common but uncomfortable and usually cause abdominal pain and constant crying. Colic can be a sign of many situations, such as ingesting air during lactation or a bottle, ingesting foods that produce many gases, or intolerance to certain foods or components, for example.
To relieve cramps, you can make a warm water compress on your baby’s belly, massage your belly in circular motions, and place your baby to burp after each shot. If cramps don’t go away, it’s important to consult your pediatrician for some pain relievers.
- To relieve your baby’s cramps.
- Very common from the second week of life.
- Due to bowel immaturity.
- You can follow some tips.
- Such as:.
These techniques can be used in combination or alone, until the one that works best to relieve your baby’s cramps is found. When the baby feels colic, it’s normal for him or her to cry a lot. Thus, if you are very irritated, it is important to calm it first, give it your knees and, only then, to do the indicated techniques to release the gases naturally.
If the baby is fed adequate milk, a good alternative is to replace milk with a milk that does not cause as many colic, which may be enriched with probiotics. However, before deciding on milk replacement, you should first talk to your pediatrician, as there are many alternatives on the market. Learn how to choose the best milk for your baby.
An excellent home remedy to treat colic in the baby that is no longer breastfed is to give it small doses of infusion of chamomile and fennel, since these medicinal plants have an antispasmodic effect, which relieves colic and decreases gas production.
For exclusively breast-feeding babies, the best solution may be for the mother to drink these teas as they go through milk, which can relieve the baby’s cramps.
To make the tea, simply put 1 teaspoon of chamomile and another teaspoon of fennel in a cup of boiling water, let cool, filter and give it to the baby. Here’s another home remedy option that helps relieve baby cramps.
The main cause of colic in infants is the fact that their digestive tract is still immature, which occurs until about 6 months, however, colic can also occur due to:
Normally, while the baby is breastfeeding, especially when the baby is not holding the breast or bottle properly or even if he or she cries a lot, this increases the air supply, increasing the risk of colic and is because the baby still does not coordinate breathing with the ability to swallow.
In addition, if your baby has nasal congestion, poor grip or flu and cold, it is natural to increase the amount of air they ingest, increasing the risk of cramps. Here’s how to get the right control.
Lactose intolerance is a problem that causes symptoms such as diarrhea, stomach pain and swelling, and gas, which usually appear within 30 minutes to 2 hours after ingesting milk.
In general, lactose intolerance occurs in older children, adolescents and adults, and if a woman breastfeeds, she should also avoid foods that contain milk.
Allergy to cow’s milk protein can cause colic, as well as skin lesions, itching, vomiting and diarrhoea, for example, and the diagnosis of cow’s milk allergy usually occurs in the first year of the child’s life. Here’s how to tell you if your baby is allergic to milk.
In these cases, it is important to give the child hypoallergenic or non-allergic formulas to avoid allergies, and if the breastfeeding mother should exclude the consumption of cow’s milk and its derivatives.
When exposed to noisy and restless environments, babies may feel uncomfortable and scared, which can cause cramping.
Feeding the mother can cause colic in the baby, so it’s important to be careful to try to identify gas-causing foods. Some of the foods best known to cause this type of effects are:
Generally, the same gas-causing foods in the mother are also those that cause the baby and, therefore, to know how the baby reacts, it is difficult to be aware of certain signs after breastfeeding, such as swelling of the belly, crying, irritation or difficulty. . Sleep. If these signs are obvious, the mother should reduce the amount and distribute the consumption of these foods between meals, to relieve the baby’s colic.
However, if the baby still has colic, it may be necessary to stop eating these foods for at least the first 3 months of breastfeeding and then reintroduce them later in small amounts, testing the baby’s reaction.
Watch all these tips in our nutritionist’s video: