my 6 month old dd was diagnosed with a chest infection on Tuesday, we are on amoxiciline 3 times a day and infant parecetomol 4. She has been arching her back about 70/80 % of the time i try to nurser her sometimes she takes the bottle other times she wont take it either.  (we are combination feeding)

so far she has wet nappies but worrying that if she keeps this up she will get dehydrated.  She doesent seem to have a temp anymore, but i am still giving the calpol as she seems in pain and very very cranky. 

has anyone experienced this before and have any advice?

thank you so much

alex

Hi

Not dealt with a chest infection but have had several ear infections. If your LO has an ear infection caused by the same infection (which is quite possible/likely) it can make them very reluctant to feed. The amoxycillin will treat it, but you do need to give pain relief so they can swallow. I would also start using ibuprofen/baby nurofen as well as the calpol.

Also keep a very careful eye on her for thrush (really common with the antibiotics) and any pain in your nipples be quite to seek treatment. Give her some probiotics - either live yogurt direct to her if she is on yogurt type solids for her or eat them yourself and she'll get some.

I hope she is better soon, its horrible seeing them so poorly.
Tamsin x

Hi

 ITs awful when they are sick isnt it.  My DD was hopsitalised for a week when she was 10 days old with bronchiolitis and had to have oxygen tubes up her nose to help her breathe due to one side of her lung being full of the infection (they showed us the chest xray

She was completely off her food too so was also on a drip but the general idea was little and often with feeds so just keep offering her a feed and the little she takes will add up.  Its possible that she is finding sucking hard at the moment have you considered buying a 'free flow cup' you can get one for about £1 from asda and offer her that with her usual milk and/or coolled boiled water at least then she will only have to sip and not suck so might find it easier.  (my DD is 5 and 1/2 months now and uses one of these fairly easily)

If you are weaning then perhaps you could mash/puree foods that are high in water content and offer a bit of that too (ie pears, carrots, etc)

Hope she gets better soon

Gem

thanks girls. i ended up calling nhs 24 through the night saturday / into sunday morning. she wouldnt stop crying and i couldnt settle her - she crashed out exhausted at bedtime but was still refusing to feed when she woke afterwards. i could tell she was hungry as she was makign her wee noise she makes, but wouldnt feed. i had given calpol & baby nurofen, checked nappy, winded her etc etc but nothing would calm her.

it turns out she is just going through a phase where she doesent want to feed bacuse she is wanting to observe the world, the midwife said its pretty common at 6 months+ - and being not well and getting all her meds throughout the day will make her fight it even more as she was associating the 2 together. (i was giving her penicillin then calpol then trying to feed her) Midwife advised me to break them up a bit, and NOT to fight with her and try to latch her on when she wasnt wanting to bed fed..(even if she was hungry!) to distract her and walk about etc - then try again when she was calmer. thankfully i have managed to work through the worst of it - she would let me feed her when she was tired - so just after a nap, and now she is on the mend we arent having to give her calpol or nurofen so she isnt quite so grumpy when we come near with the syringe!

she still fusses sometimes (this morning when i tried to feed her before her nap!!) but i know she will make up for it at some point in the day so i am not stressing and trying to force her on - which is defo helping!

i was positive she has some sinister underlying infection the gp hadnt picked up - wouold never had thought it was that she was taking the huff and decided she didnt want cuddled in for a nurse when she could be nosying at the world around her!!!

Alex