Now with extra pooping?

Neil is wondering if anyone else has experienced radically increased pooping from your baby when you switched from regular formula to a formula enhanced with Omega 3s. It makes sense to me that that could happen, but it would be nice to have some data points.

Comments

[Elizabeth]

This is a little further out, but I take Omega-3's and still breastfeed and my 14-month-old poops multiple times a day still. Daycare is amazed, as it's like 3-4 poopy diapers in the 9 hours he's there, plus usually at least 1-2 more at home every day.

[sue]

Not pooping, but with my first, any formula with omega-3's would make her violently vomit after each feeding. When we switched to a non-omega-3 formula, the vomiting lessened to garden variety spit-up (still prolific, but not as scary). So I definitely believe it could cause some stomach upset. With my second, I breastfeed but need to supplement with formula. We've stayed away from the omega-3 formula, but I take omega-3's. I haven't notied a problem with me taking them. (and he might not be as sensitive as his sister)

[Tanya]

I've used Omega 3 formula right from the start and it's been fine. But now we're starting on solids so that's a different story. Peas look the same coming out as they do going in, who knew?!
:)

[geeky]

If extra Omega-3's in the formula refers to DHA/ARA type formulas, then these have been in the news lately as associated with diarrhea and digestive distress in babies. the extra pooping could br a milder version of that, or it could be nothing. Here is a link to the report detailing this - can't vouch for its science as I am not a scientist/statistician.

http://cornucopia.org/index.php/replacing-mother-infant-formula-report/

[Lisa]

I EFB but this past week my daughter was on nebulizer treatments and antibiotics and suddenly went from once a week poops to 3x a day poops! It's a bit of a suprise but I assume it was most likely from the medicine, possibly because she's 6mo. on Sat. and she could be changing her poop schedule.

Long story short, I think it's really easy to ofset a baby's poop schedule and I wouldn't be suprised it was the Omega3 formula that made the change, but it could just as easily be something else...

I'm no help am I ;)

[Katy]

When we put our son (18 months) on a DHA supplement, he got diarrhea until we took him off it. He has a language delay, and fish oil is supposed to be helpful for speech issues, so we're looking for another way to get the good oils into him. Any ideas?

[MG]

I would be wary of the DHA additives in infant formula - here is a recent article that could explain what is happening...

http://foodconsumer.org/7777/8888/C_hildren_amp_W_omen_33/012510002008_Lab-made_imitation_breast_milk_puts_infants_at_risk_study_shows.shtml

[kirsten]

No experience with the formula, but my husband noticed radical poop changes when he started taking O3 supplements.

[katie]

katy, my 16 month old is willing to drink a spoonful of flax seed oil directly from the spoon every day. she actually asks for more! - worth a try.
lisa, just a thought (i'm a pediatric rn) - antibiotics kill bacteria (both good and bad), so you may want to look into giving your little one some probiotics to replace the good bacteria in her gut (acidopholus, etc). you can get powdered kind that you mix with water and give her a spoonful. sorry if you already know all this...

[Neil]

Just to provide some more gory detail: we weaned my 8-month old son at the beginning of the year. For the longest time he pooped around 2-3 times daily, but about a week and a half ago he started pooping anywhere from three to a whooping eight (!) times a day. The consistency and colour (ugh) was still the same, but the frequency was rather flabbergasting.

It seems to have gone back to normal but I was really surprised by the fairly dramatic change. The interesting thing is he's had formula supplemented with omega-3's before (Infamil) but it was the "birth+" kind. The kind that seemingly caused this cresting wave of poop was the Nestlé 6 months and up brand.

I read the article that geeky pointed out and it makes sense that different formulations of formula (pun intended) could affect babies differently. In our case it was the only thing that changed so it seems to point to the formula, but we have no idea - we thought maybe there was a 7-month poop "progression" we hadn't heard about. :)

It's really a sign that you're truly a parent when you start talking about your kid's bowel movements publicly, isn't it?

[Moxie]

Hey, if dog owners can do it, why can't we?

[alex]

When I went back to work, my son started drinking formula. We acutally saw the opposite thing happen. He went from regular poops every day to stretches of 2-5 days without a poop.

I was wondering if all the added iron in the formula was contributing to slow down in poop.

[Melba]

Neil, there are a few things going on with babies around 6, 7, 8 ish months old that will lead to changes like this... to name a few:

- the iron stores that the baby got from mom during pregnancy begin to deplete. This is why we start solid foods by around 6 months; the iron stores need to be replaced (via baby cereal or other high iron baby food) and babies have really high iron needs. Anyway my point is that you probably started solid foods within the past few months, introducing a new and less consistent iron source... at the same time baby's iron stores are slowly going down... at the same time the formula may have either more or less iron than breastmilk (depends on mom's iron levels and eating habits), so it could be related to changes in baby's iron.

- Certain foods cause softer / more often stools and other foods cause firmer / less often stools. The four P's: prunes, pears, peaches, and peas, will cause lots of mushy poop. This is what we found anyway. Things like bananas, rice cereal, and applesauce cause firmer stools that are less frequent.

So if baby is eating lots of fruit like peaches and pears, and at the same time maybe his iron levels are changing, well then I wouldn't be surprised about the poop changes.

Also, for what its worth, the only difference between the stage 1 and stage 2 formula that we use (Similac with Omega 3 & 6) is that stage 2 has more calcium. I have no idea if that could affect stools but maybe?

[Ali]

As others have said, the DHA/ARA enhanced formulas are creating significant problems for many infants. The National Alliance for Breastfeeding Advocacy (NABA) and the Cornucopia Institute have jointly filed a petition with the Federal Trade Commission to prohibit the false and misleading advertising of these formulas, and they have also filed a petition with the FDA to have a warning label placed on these formulas.

[Moxie]

Melba, the fortified iron is actually really controversial. There's some thought that giving infants foods fortified with iron (instead of with natural iron in them) blocks their bodies' abilities to absorb the iron in breastmilk and other foods. So giving kids baby cereal fortified with iron starting at 6 months could be setting them up not to be able to process naturally-occurring iron as well.

I don't think we'll know for sure for another 10-20 years.

Alex, iron in formula does slow down poop.

[Melba]

Sorry this is going off topic... but I gotta say, I'm not really a fan of the article that was posted (the "replacing mother" story). Maybe I'm just hypersensitive about the whole breastfeeding - formula feeding issue, but I don't see the problem with saying that certain formulas are "as close as ever to breastmilk". Those of us who formula feed by necessity, not choice, are looking for whatever formula is "closest" to breastmilk because we want what's best for our babies given the circumstances. It broke my heart that I was unable to breastfeed my baby (really, I think I started down a scary PPD path because of it) and I'm just now (8 months later) able to get over the guilt. I understand and agree that breast is best but it really makes me angry that there is so much pressure out there to breastfeed or you are a bad mom.

[kate]

I haven't used an O3 formula, but I gave my 9-month-old a yoghurt with a baby O3 capsule mixed through and it gave her explosive diarrhea. Haven't tried that again.
Then I bought O3 enriched cows milk for my 2 year old and the same thing happened, to a slightly lesser degree.
I think we'll stay away from them for the time being.

[hush]

DS is 4 months old and has been drinking a "cocktail" of breastmilk and store-brand DHA/ARA-enriched formula fortified with iron since birth (about 95% formula/5% breastmilk due to low supply).

All of his poops thus far have been normal in consistency and timing. He is happy, healthy, and huge, so we are sticking with it until the next scary study comes out.

As an aside -- we have a suspicion of heated plastics and never give warm bottles or use warm water when preparing the formula.

[Jasmin]

I've been on their website and I saw that they have the pagakce or w/e for 70 but then the Herbal Booster is seperate Do you have to have the Herbal Booster for it to work? And, if it's supposed to w/o it but doesn't, would you still get your money back if you didn't order that part?

[Marcielly]

because i will tell you this i don't live at the states and i asked my haunsbd to buy me a flat iron and he went a head and bought me the CHI,FHI and the corioliss pro but i'm lost now which one should i use pls help because i think that i will chose two of them and give the third one away .

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