My Sweater / My Bow / Amalia’s Dress
For today’s mom talk post, I want to talk about the glamorous topic of spit up. Last week I asked my Instagram followers what they did for their spit-uppy babies and got well over 400 responses. It was amazing, and I felt so grateful to have such an amazing community of moms by my digital side. But then I received a ton of questions asking me to share the responses. Clearly I couldn’t share them all, so I’m hoping that all of you mamas comment below with your tips below to help out anyone else having this problem.
Here’s our story…
Amalia started spitting up around 6 weeks. It was just a little here or there and I wasn’t too concerned. Then, suddenly, at 14 weeks, things went totally crazy. She was throwing up seemingly everything she ate whether it was from bottle or breast. She wasn’t fussy, but it was still disturbing to see as a mom.
To remedy it, this is what I did:
1. Feed her as upright as possible whether from bottle or breast (we use Dr. Brown’s bottles, BTW)
2. Watch what I eat (no garlic, cauliflower, etc, cut back on dairy and sugar)
3. Hold her upright for at least 20 minutes after each feed.
4. Give her probiotics every morning.
5. Burp her between breasts and halfway through a bottle
Despite all of that, she’s still spitting up regularly after feedings. We called our pediatrician who mirrored what most of you said on Instagram: Amalia is a “happy spitter” and it’s more of a laundry problem than anything else. She should grow out of it by six months or so.
As long as she’s not in pain, I can handle the laundry. I bought this set of 10 terry cloth bibs and she goes through at least three per day. The bandana ones are cute but if there’s a lot of vom, it gets everywhere. Trust.
So tell me, what did you do for your babies who spit up? Any tips for this frustrated mama?
Reminder: Mom talk is made up of shorter posts where I share a “momproblem” I’m having and ask for your advice. The idea is that all moms can benefit from the comments below! Have an idea for mom talk? Send it my way: julia@lemonstripes.com
unfortunately its just a messy time.. their little bodies are developing, it will pass. patience, good laundry detergent and lots of burp clothes!
Patience is the one I need to work on 🙂
This happened to my daughter too. The first time she had a major spit up was when we were at her day care for orientation and it got EVERYWHERE – I was like, I swear she’s usually not this messy!!! They didn’t care but I was so embarrassed. She’ll be 6 months next week and has mostly outrgrown it. I just make sure to always have a cloth handy whenever she eats in case a little (or a lot) decides to come back up
Isn’t it funny how that stuff always happens at the worst possible moments? Amalia’s first blow out was when my friend came to visit her for the first time… on her LAP!
My little one spits up all.the.time. She is a very, very fast eater, and I think that sometime that causes her to spit up. If she seems overly excited to eat and is eating really fast, I will stop her and play her sound machine (ocean noises) to try to get her to relax and calm down. I feel like she swallows less air which makes spitting up a tiny bit less likely. It seems to work every once in awhile 🙂
That’s a great idea! Amalia is also a pretty aggressive/fast eater. Every time she eats it’s like I’ve never fed her before. I try to take breaks but she gets frustrated, so I’ll try the sound machine and books. Thank you!
I never comment, but this is a topic I know a lot about. My (now 6 year old) daughter spit up multiple times a day for the first seven months of her life. It stopped literally overnight. Like one day I realized that I had not been thrown up on and didn’t smell like curdled milk and that was it. Poof. All the things you mentioned in your post work to some extent, but at the end of the day she probably needs to develop a little further and then it will magically stop. We have zero pictures of her without a bib on until she hit that magic day. There are way worse things than this, so just power through and it will be over soon!
Wow. I literally CANNOT wait for that day to come! And so true, it’s not the worst problem in the world. I just hope she’s not in pain… but it doesn’t seem like it so far. Thanks for sharing your story!
I am not a birth mother, though a step and an aunt. I admit that I love holding OPBs (other people’s babies) until the moment they spit up. Then it’s all, okay, here’s your baby back, lol. BUT, that said, it seems to me that babies spit up. Until they stop. I don’t know enough about the early digestive systems of infants, but I’ve heard that there’s a ton of gas generated while nursing and even more in bottle, and that latching was sometimes an issue with friends, relatives, as was overproduction. But again, spitting up and pooping seem to be two things that babies do a lot of, lol. We did affectionately refer to my friend’s baby as Exorcist Baby–even the mother herself, with a laugh.
My daughter was also a “happy spitter” as was I as a baby apparently. You just get used to it and they absolutely grow out of it. I had a bunch of the old school cloth diapers that Gerber still sells https://www.toysrus.com/product?productId=42448216&source=CAPLA_DF:42448216:BRUS&cagpspn=plab_2BF85C29&camp=PLAPPCG-_-PID2BF85C29:BRUS&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI7cCP3JXB1wIVnkoNCh3qpgJcEAQYAyABEgL5yvD_BwE, that I always had on my shoulder if I was holding her or under her head if she was laying somewhere. They are super absorbent and work really well. I just also got use to having her in clothes that were spit up on and stopped changing her every time she did – I just wiped it off with the cloth diaper.
My son spit up ALL the time when he was an infant and we did two things: 1) we put a rolled up hand towel underneath the mattress in the bassinet so it was at a bit of an incline so he wasn’t laying completely flat which helped with his apparent indigestion. 2) We switched formulas to a lactose free version. ( I should add that this was 12 years ago when you could still admit you formula fed your baby…not sure if I’ll be judged for admitting this lol). He’s not lactose intolerant now at 12 years old but at the time, those two adjustments worked. Hope this helps some of your fellow mama readers 🙂
Taffeta & Tulips
My first baby boy was also a spitter, but his turned out to be dairy/soy intolerance and pretty bad reflux, so we switched to expensive formula and reflux medicine. We did everything on your list, but we also used a wedge in the crib. I will say about 6/7m it got better once sitting up but then 8/9m came back for a bit once he started moving around so much.
Have you tried completely dairy free to see if it goes away completely?
I do highly recommend the green sprout stay dry bibs—outfit lifesaver!! We have a bib on in every picture until about 14months!
I had twins, and one of mine was not a happy spitter. He constantly spit up including through his nose, which did not feel good. We did all of the things recommended — keeping him elevated after feedings, elevating the head of his crib a bit (using books), etc… We did end up giving him Zantac (but he had other issues). Zantac does not decrease frequency of spit up, but did turn him into a “happy spitter”. My best advice is to use those Gerber diapers as burp cloths — never have a shoulder unprotected.
Poor baby! That breaks my heart to hear but glad you were able to fix his pain. yes to burp clothes 24/7…
I am having the EXACT same problem with my 16 week old! She is totally a happy spitter! There is never a rhyme or reason when she spits up…. it could be immediately after she eats, or two hours later… sometimes she will smile at me and then spit-up just trickles out of her mouth.
I also think that now, at this age, they are a little bit more active – lots of leg kicks/lifts and rolling about, so I’m guessing that probably has something to do with it. She goes through at least 3 bibs a day too. I told everyone to buy her more for Christmas! 🙂
Same with timing! Sometimes it’s like two hours after she eats and she was totally fine until that moment. It’s so frustrating!
I’ve learned the hard way to bring two changes of clothes. If it’s not spit up, it’s poop haha 🙂