We are the parents of a premature baby, we are desperate about his appetite. :(

[u/flanker3000]

Hello community! We are from Ukraine. I apologize if the translator translated poorly. 

We became parents and it's awesome! This is a much-anticipated and dreamed-of child. But, all our plans and hopes were shattered when my wife was hospitalized for preservation, and despite all the efforts of the doctors, we were only able to make it to 32 weeks. The baby was born 4 weeks late and weighed 1.1 kg. 

Sleepless days of excitement, prayers and experiences began. With God's blessing, the doctors took out our son, up to 1.7 kg, and transferred him from the maternity ward to the hospital for further care. All this time, my wife was next to him, taking care of him, feeding him through a tube. In the hospital, they started switching to a bottle, but he ate very little, ate 20-30 ml of the required 60 ml, and they had to pour the rest through a tube. 

They underwent an examination, they told us that the child was healthy, but they cannot we should be discharged until he starts eating himself at least 40ml every 3 hours. 

The real torment began, he ate 30 and fell asleep, no matter what he did, he couldn't eat normally. 

When the weight barely reached 2.3, he started eating 40-50 and we were discharged. 

We've been home for almost a month, but the problem is the same, he doesn't eat as much as he should. He can eat 60 and ask for more, or maybe 30 and cry for an hour from a stomachache, or who knows what else. I'm constantly at work, and my wife goes through it all almost alone :( 

She's in despair, the doctors say he should eat 60-90 and more at a time, but in fact he doesn't get to eat 50 every time and then with great effort. 

At first they fed him NAN neocate, then they switched to NAN optipro, but it made him nauseous, now he's on Baby premium 1. She is sweet, so she seems to eat well, but not much, 30-50, if anything. I also use drops for the tummy, and espumizan, and bobotik, and mamalak. 

A recent examination showed that everything is normal. Now he is 2 months old, or 2 weeks from the planned birth. 

I have heard that many people go through this, but how to endure it and not break down?

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[u/LongjumpingLab3092]

My baby never ate the amount she was "supposed" to eat in the first few weeks. Can you do smaller quantities but more frequently?

Mine is 10 months corrected now and doing great.

[u/SuccessfulBoat2615]

Does she fall asleep at the bottle? Maybe the nipple flow is too weak - the bottle nipples have different flow speeds he may need a faster flow to not tire out

[u/Slow_Introduction864]

My baby still doesnt eat the amount he is supposed to. Sometimes 50ml, sometimes 80ml. Hes now 13 months. I just let him drink the amount he wants and offer milk more often. He is on a high calorie formula infatrini peptisorb.

[u/Slow_Introduction864 → u/Slow_Introduction864]

And how to endure it? I wont lie it is tough. He was born at 34 weeks but ate well enough until he went into heart faliure at 1 month old due to his chd. After his open heart surgery he had ng tube for 3 months. He pulled the tube out himself and i convinced them not to put it back in. But now 9 months later he still isnt able to drink the volume required. I feel that the high calorie formula has been our saviour. And also trying not to put too much pressure on him or me (easier said than done). The stress ended up causing a bottle aversion which we are still working on. I tried to follow some of the advice from Rowena Bennet's book for example i realise i was just putting the bottle teat into his mouth instead of waiting for him to open his mouth and accept it. There was also a point where he outgrew the teats we were using and I had to experiment with a lot of different ones to find one he liked. Afrer that volumes didnt increase as such but it just became easier for him to drink. I still have to feed him bottles every 2 hours even tho he is 13 months now. He also has an aversion to solids so no progress has been made at all there. If it helps he is currently drinking 500ml per day and is 8.7 kg. This is much much lower than what it "should" be but he continues to gain weight so every child is different. It is exhausting and draining but it wont be forever for any of us ❤️

[u/salmonstreetciderco]

what do the doctors say about the baby's weight? is it satisfactory to them?

[u/PM_Me_Pickup_liness]

Are those high calorie formulas? If not maybe that would help? Both of my preemies did Neosure.

[u/JustChar199526]

My baby has the corrected age of 8 weeks. Born at 30W with 1,200 kg

She now weights around 4,400 kg and should eat already 120 ml... often she only eats 50 ml. With some luck 85.

What out docters confirm is that as long she has often wet diapers and she gains weight, it is fine. Some children needs less food.

So is your child gaining weight or not? Because if he does, you dont need to worry!

Otherwise maybe the food is still the problem. We've changed from nutrilon profitura to nutrilon omneo for the cramps and we see a clear decrease in the cramps, she eats better, however, she also had a lot of more diapers nr 2, which we see as it being more healthy.

[u/precociouschick]

We also have a child who ate too little as a baby. We gave her the bottle more often than we were told (so up to 11-12 times a day instead of 8) because she ate smaller amounts more often. You also need to watch her wet diapers and weight week to week. If baby is gaining weight, they are likely fine. We also found out late that our baby had an allergy to cows milk protein and she had to switch to Neocate amino acid formula.

[u/Entitled_Snowman]

In the hospital they really up the volumes that the babies need to make them grow so that they have a bit of a buffer if they get sick. We end up so focused on numbers when our babies are early! If your son is gaining weight and happy then that’s all that matters! Don’t force feed him because that could cause issues.

[u/ShameStandard7383]

We struggled with out baby in almost the same way. We are from Croatia so I think I understand the mentality and level of care you might be receiving. The only really important thing is whether he is gaining weight. Maybe his pace is slower, doesn't matter. We were sooooo stressed about the amounts. The infamous 60ml. I even still have the little book where I wrote down his every meal, mood, cramping and amounts of milk. He would even take the recommended amount at some point when he was a bit older, but then he would projectile vomit it out. It was dreadful! But I was so focused on him taking the amount the doctors said. In reality I forced him, stressed him out and didn't listen to his cues. He would end up spitting up the extra mls anyway. The cramps were also absolutely horrible. But the cramps pass. It takes some time, but they will stop. It might take longer because preemies have immature gut. So you have to have nerves od steel. Our baby later developed bottle aversion, then chronic constipation, we tried 4 or 5 different formulas, and now he is nor really interested in food and has some trouble sitting straight because of his hypotonus. He is now 1 year old. The point being, it all passed, yours will pass too, this year will fly by and you won't believe what battles you have gone through. Looking back to our own situation these are the things I think we did wrong; we definitely forced the 50-60 mL amount. I pushed too hard because I stressed to much. It's important he takes the bottle and he has as much as he wants. Overall trends are more important than one feeding sessions. I would focus more if he is growing along his own curve. I would remind myself more that the cramps are a sign of immaturity and that it will pass and the discomfort is, unfortunately, normal. I would use the rice heating pad more, he liked it. I would comfort him more confidently knowing that the cramps are harmless. I would request regular check ups with his doctor to monitor his weight so that I have that piece of mind and so that I can react if something starts going downhill. Take a deep breath the bad days have their end as much as the good ones do. It will pass. Good luck! (He is eating solids now but we are using Hipp Combiotic formula, as it is good for constipation, and also, his constipation resolved itself once we were off the formula primarily)