If your baby is constantly underfed, it may result in muscle wasting. Muscle wasting is a condition that impacts the development of your baby's muscles by causing your baby's muscles to break down and degenerate.
Although newborns generally sleep 16-18 hours each day, unusual sleepiness may be an indication that your baby is underfed.
Reaches for or points to food. Opens his or her mouth when offered a spoon or food. Gets excited when he or she sees food. Uses hand motions or makes sounds to let you know he or she is still hungry.
Feed smaller amounts.
Overfeeding always makes spitting up worse. If the stomach is completely full, spitting up is more likely. If your baby is gaining well, give him smaller amounts (at least 1 ounce less than you have been giving).
Newborns should not go more than about 4–5 hours without feeding. Signs that babies are hungry include: moving their heads from side to side. opening their mouths.
Most babies are able to sleep through the night – or sleep for at least six hours without waking up to eat – sometime between 3 to 6 months of age. Healthy babies who are born full-term are generally able to sleep through the night without a feeding starting at 3 months of age or when they weigh 12 to 13 pounds.
Your Baby is Experiencing a Growth Spurt.
Growth spurts can occur at different ages, but the most common are 3 weeks to 4 weeks, 7 weeks, 10 weeks, 3 months to 4 months, 6 months, and 18 months. During a growth spurt, it is very likely that your baby will be sleeping more than usual.
Bottle-fed babies
Newborn: every 2 to 3 hours. At 2 months: every 3 to 4 hours. At 4 to 6 months: every 4 to 5 hours. At 6+ months: every 4 to 5 hours.
Even if your baby falls asleep, try burping them for a few minutes before placing them back down to sleep. Otherwise, they make wake up in pain with trapped gas.
This is how your baby's brain grows. There is a lot of activity happening in their brain during light sleep, and their body often reacts to this stimulation by moving, twitching, making lots of noises and facial expressions including smiles.
If your baby is hungry and takes to the bottle or breast after vomiting, go right ahead and feed them. Liquid feeding after vomiting can sometimes even help settle your baby's nausea. Start with small amounts of milk and wait to see if they vomit again.
Always burp your baby when feeding time is over. To help prevent the milk from coming back up, keep your baby upright after feeding for 10 to 15 minutes, or longer if your baby spits up or has GERD. But don't worry if your baby spits sometimes. It's probably more unpleasant for you than it is for your baby.
Support your baby's head and neck, make sure their tummy and back is nice and straight (not curled up), and rub or pat their back gently. You don't need to spend ages burping your baby, a couple of minutes should be enough.
When I'm pulling my lips into a little 'O' shape and widening my eyes, it's playtime. This look, wide open eyes and round little mouth, is a common one for excited babies who want to play with their parents. They might also clap, wave their hands, or even make a sound or two.
A baby's first social smile usually appears by the end of their second month. That's one reason why, as a pediatrician, seeing babies and their parents at the 2-month-old checkup is always a great pleasure.
As air travels upward, burping positions usually require the baby to be at least partially upright. This position encourages any air bubbles to move upward, passing through the throat and out of the mouth. It is possible to burp a sleeping baby, often without waking them completely.
“Burping usually helps with hiccups,” Dr. Liermann says. Burp your baby during feeding to prevent hiccups from striking. Try taking a burp break after 2 or 3 ounces.
Separating Fact from Fiction in Pediatric Medicine: Burping Doesn't Prevent SIDS, and Other Gas Related Nonsense. Though a seemingly worldwide practice, there is little plausibility and no evidence to support burping infants before, during, or after feeds. And it doesn't have anything to do with SIDS.
Maybe you're worried that not burping babies will cause them to spit up more. That's actually been studied! A study of 71 mother-baby duos found that burping babies did not reduce the rates of colic but did increase the rates of regurgitation or spit-up compared to not burping babies.
Another great time to change your newborn's diaper is before or during feedings. If you're breastfeeding, as you switch from one breast to the other, take the time to check her diaper, and change it if needed. If you're bottle-feeding, check her diaper right before you give her the bottle.
If your baby is healthy, gaining weight, and seems content after most breastfeeds, they're getting what they need. Babies who are feeding well can take anywhere between five minutes and 40 minutes at each feed.
For the purpose of this outline, understand that we refer to your baby's "nighttime" as a 12-hour period, such as 7 pm - 7 am. Additionally, you'll see that breastfed babies will need to eat more frequently than formula-fed babies as a general rule.