Babies cry a lot. The reasons for crying are quite varied, and one of them is hunger. But it is not always possible to reliably assess the reason for the crying of the baby, so it is important to be able to determine whether the baby has enough breast milk.
Necessary
- - Scales;
- - counting the number of urinations.
Instructions
Step 1
When the baby is put to the breast on demand and in the absence of foreign objects for sucking (bottles and pacifiers), milk in the breast will be produced exactly as much as the baby needs. Make sure to breastfeed for any requirement. Listen and see if your baby is swallowing milk.
Step 2
Check if the baby is latching on correctly. When sucking, the baby's mouth should contain the entire breast halo, not just the nipple, and the baby's lips should be turned inside out. If the attachment is incorrect, try to fix it. You will most likely have to re-attach the baby to the breast. Do not forget that at the time of inserting the breast, the nipple is not directed into the mouth, but towards the baby's nose.
Step 3
Remove the diaper from the child for a day and count how many times he peed. A quantity greater than 10 indicates that there is enough milk. In the first days of life, the number of urinations should be one more than the age of the newborn in days. It is also important to monitor the discharge of meconium.
Step 4
Weigh your baby no more than once a week. The minimum gain per week is 125 g. However, do not forget that in the first days the baby loses up to 10% in weight. Please note that you should not weigh the child more often than once a week. Moreover, there is no point in weighing before and after each feeding, since a breastfed baby should not eat a fixed amount of milk in one feeding. In addition, all scales, even electronic ones, have an error of up to several tens of grams. Therefore, it is impossible to reliably assess small increases.
