Natural Gas!

I may have discovered the solution to the world's energy crisis: (drumroll please...) Abbigail Edmonds! Yes, it's true. She is a fabulous producer of natural gas!

The nurses put her on soy formula in the hospital due to some digestive issues. Okay, it was more than digestive issues, she had diarrhea and screamed for an entire night in the nursery. Anyway, soy formula is supposed to be a little easier on the digestive system. It even says right on the front of the container "for fussiness and gas". Good grief, I can hardly imagine if she was on regular formula!

Unfortunately, all the gas-production makes her one fussy baby. Like all moms, I wish there was a miracle cure for a gassy baby, but alas... So here is what we do to help:

1) burping. (duh). Unfortunately Abby is hard to burp. Sometimes you can pat her back
for the longest time to no avail. I also try sitting her up with her back and head very straight
up, and sometimes that will do it.

2) Mylicon. Shoot, I just put a dose of it in every bottle!

3) "rolling" her tummy. Hats off to my friend Vicky for telling me about this one, and it really
does seem to help: to do this, lay baby on her back. Bend her legs at the knee and "roll" her
legs clockwise, circling up over her belly. It's hard to do if baby is crying and tensed up. I've
found that if Abby is tensed up, if I take her ankles and just raise her legs up (like when you
change their diaper) she will usually relax them after a minute and I can "roll" them.

4) bottles: I use powdered formula, so mixing them with a spoon or butter knife seems to do
better than shaking them up, which puts so much air in. Also, if she isn't crying, I'll let it sit
5 or 10 minutes so some of the air can dissolve out.

Needless to say, I'm quite ready for her to outgrow this gassy phase!