4 week old cries for bottle feed every 30 minutes but only takes 30ml (1oz)

Question

Currently going through a nightmare with 4 week old, for the last 5 days she's been stuck in a strange rhythm.

She seems hungry and cries the house down, we make up a large bottle as we have been for a few weeks but after drinking a tiny amount (15-30ml) she falls asleep and can't be woken up by any means (up to and including touching a cold apple to her cheek and the 'inception' drop). We lay her down and within 30 minutes she's screaming the house down again and the cycle goes on.

We know she's got a much larger capacity as when she was 3 weeks she was taking 70-90ml per feed and sleeping for 3-4 hours.

Is there something wrong we're doing or a medical problem that could cause this?

Answer 1

My daughter had a similar behavior, which was due (in her case) by colic (not sure if this is the right way to say it, english is not my native language). I am not saying that this is the case for your child, but it could be worth prospecting.

What was happening to my daughter (at least how I understood it) was that feeding her calmed the pains, which would lead her to quickly fall asleep, since she was exhausted. But once asleep, the pain would quickly come back, then waking her up soon after; and crying. Etc. Such small amount of drink was due to the short span between two feedings.

Again I am not saying that your baby has colics, but your description reminded me of the situation I experienced with my daughter. One thing that worked to make her fall asleep again was to hold her like that (but it did not work for my second child...).

Answer 2

As it is a very trendy matter nowadays, I would also explore lactose intolerance as a possible cause of this. it may be that your child quickly gets under the impression she's done while it's just intolerance causing this. Therefore she quickly gets hungry, and so on... You can probably easily check this by testing soya milk for 1 or 2 feedings and see if situations gats any better.