Common causes of abdominal pain in children include wind, constipation and gastroenteritis. Young children and babies are more at risk of dehydration from gastroenteritis than adults. Often no cause can be found for abdominal pain in babies and children.
Most cases are viral, require no treatment, and will resolve on their own over a week or so; the pain itself generally lasts one or two days and then disappears.
When fed too much, a baby may also swallow air. This can produce gas, increase discomfort in the belly, and lead to crying. An overfed baby also may spit up more than usual and have loose stools. Although crying from discomfort is not colic, it can make crying more frequent and more intense in an already colicky baby.
A healthy baby may have colic if he or she cries or is fussy for several hours a day, for no obvious reason. Colicky babies often cry from 6 p.m. to midnight. Colicky crying is louder, more high-pitched, and more urgent sounding than regular crying. Colicky babies can be very hard to calm down.
Tips to relieve baby's gas discomfort at night
At the last feed before bedtime, make sure you keep their head higher than their stomach while feeding, and their backs are held as straight as can be. Allow plenty of time to burp your baby mid-feed and post-feed.
“If your baby's abdomen is swollen and hard and they haven't moved their bowels for more than a day or two or there is vomiting, call your pediatrician,” said Tiffani Payne, M.D., pediatrician with Norton Children's Medical Group – Okolona.
Gently massage your baby, pump their legs back and forth (like riding a bike) while they are on their back, or give their tummy time (watch them while they lie on their stomach). A warm bath can also help them get rid of extra gas.
Most babies are gassy from time to time, some more than others. Gassiness is often worse at night. This is due, on the most part, to baby's immature digestive system and has nothing to do with what mom does or eats.
“Almost all babies will find some baby gas relief by sucking on a pacifier,” O'Connor says, because the sucking action releases endorphins that will soothe them.
Symptoms of a gassy baby
fuss for around an hour every day. have trouble eating and sleeping. seem uncomfortable after eating. become red in the face or seem like they're in pain when crying.
What Are The Symptoms of Gas? Just as crying is a fact of baby life, so, too, is baby gas. But when your infant has painful gas, especially if it's frequent, it can cause your baby to cry or become fussy—until it's passed; unlike colic, which causes crying and fussiness that lasts for hours across days and weeks.
Who Gets Colic? Colic most often starts when a baby is about 2–5 weeks old and gets better by the time the baby is 3–4 months old. Any baby can have colic.
Symptoms include an abrupt pain that's located either in your right side under the breastbone or more toward the center of your abdomen. The pain intensifies over time but generally doesn't last for more than a few hours.
Give Them a Burp
A crying baby can gulp down a lot of air. That can make them gassy and bloated -- and make their crying worse. Burp them with gentle thumps on their back. The classic position -- with the baby's head over your shoulder -- works, but can leave a trail of spit-up down your back.
Also, babies with colic may burp frequently or pass a significant amount of gas, but this is thought to be due to swallowing air while crying, and is not a cause of colic.
What is overfeeding in babies? Overfeeding, also called over-nutrition, refers to a baby receiving more food than his stomach can hold and/or more nutrients than his intestinal tract is able to digest. A baby could receive excess nutrients from large volume feeds or an accumulative effect of small volume feeds.
Babies need to feed often because they have teeny tiny stomachs. A 4- to 5-week-old baby can only hold about 3 to 4 ounces of milk at a time. This is why babies are ravenous again only a little while after feeding. As babies grow, their stomachs also grow, enabling them to handle more milk.
Gas discomfort from burps and farts typically peaks at six weeks and improves immensely by 3 months of age. At that point, even the fussiest babies tend to settle.