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Family Forum / Pregnancy / Breastfeeding / February 2006when do you first weigh a baby?
Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped and get a weight check? Anne While I was in the hospital, yes, they weighed the babies daily. When we got home, there is a well baby check that starts 2-3 days after being home and then again at 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, etc. When we had weight problems with DD3 we were going in for more frequent weight checks and I think that was every 2-3 weeks. I would definite want the baby weighed soon after birth, if nothing else but to know what it is to write in the baby book. I cannot imagine not having the baby weighed.  SignatureSue (mom to three girls) > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? > > Anne > While I was in the hospital, yes, they weighed the babies daily. When we > got [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] >> >> Anne Just to clarify, DD3 was weighed at birth, but then not again until she was 13 days old (normally around 10 days old is the next weighing). With DD2, she was weighed at birth, then 48 hours later (she lost a 1 lb), then the next day as well, and the next.... But really, if the milk hasn't come in, exatly what do they expect to happen !!! Nothing will happen until the milk is in. As Anne said, if everything else if fine, then after the initial birth weighing, there shouldn't be any reason to weigh a baby until a good few days later when the milk is in and things have settled down a bit. As it happens, DD2s weight ran long the bottom end of the weight curve the whole time she was a baby, and it did go beneath it as well. Now, she's a very very slim and active 4 year old (wish I'd inherited the thin gene, she doesn't get it from me !). Cheers Ailsa > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? > > Anne Both of mine were weighed within an hour or so of birth, and then just before they left the hospital (less than 48 hours later). I took each to a pediatrician at about 1 week, and they were weighed again. Clisby > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? For my first, she was weighed at the hospital and again before we left (3 days later, c-section). Her weight was fine but we were supplementing due to lousy advice at the hospital. Second was weighed at the hospital and then again on day 4 at the ped's. We went in to get her PKU test done, since we left the hospital earlier than they wanted. That's when the ped started talking about supplementing, but my milk had just come in so I knew the baby would be fine. We came back 5 days later for a recheck and she had put on 17 ounces!!!! I knew she was fine. Mary W. Mine were weighed each day at the hospital. Then they have the first visit at the pediatrician's office within five days (IIRC) of birth. I tried to skip that one with Lorelei; I could see she was getting plenty of milk and AFAIK it's to check for feeding problems and maybe jaundice, and you should have seen how bent out of shape they got. Leslie > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of > babies not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered > what others have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? > Do you visit the Ped and get a weight check? I'm in the US and things vary but my experience is: #1: Weighed at birth, before we left the hospital at 3 days, and again at his first appt. which was at 2 weeks. #2: Weighed at birth, before we left the next day, and again at the first check up which was at 2 weeks. SignatureNikki Hunter 4/99 Luke 4/01 Thing One and Thing Two :-) EDD 4/06 perhaps I should have said 2nd weigh check! Both mine were weighed in the delivery room, but even with borderline concerns about the 1st, he was lethargic and jaundiced, we just watched and waited and fed and fed and fed. Weighed him at 13 days and was fine, probably did dip below 2.5kg, but almost certainly not 10% of his body weight. Anne Our hospital had us weigh in at their clinic the first Tuesday after she was born. There was no reason to go back if it was considered normal and of course, she was seen by her ped. Kyle McPeck kyle@mcpeck.com President's Day Sale at BabyAge http://www.crcoupons.com/babyage > normal and of course, she was seen by her ped. there is no "of course" about it, here in the UK, children don't have a pediatrician, they just have a GP like an adult. For babies the only routine checks are a 6 weeks, then again at 8 months (which reminds me, must book Ada in for hers). Anne > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? > > Anne Here in the U.S., they had weighed DD at birth in the morning, again that night, and the next night. B/c I was BF, they wanted me to have her weighed at the Women's Center where the LCs are the week after our discharge. She had her two-week checkup at the ped. Lots of weighing going on in that first week, and she was just a normal baby without any complications. I wonder if the hospital was too worried about my BF her. At least, the ped was/is very laid back. > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? > > Anne I am in Canada, so I think it is a bit different. My daughter was weighed at birth, and just before we left, so day 2. Then about 2 days after we were home (day 4) the community health nurse came to visit. The nurse weighed her in our home. She came back every couple of days to re-weigh, as she wasn't gaining, although not losing either. The health nurse comes as much or as little as you would like her to and as we were somewhat nervous first-time parents, we had her come fairly often until our daughter started gaining, which was at about 9 days. For the next one, I doubt I will have the baby weighed as much. The first doctor's appointment here is at one week, so we took her to our doctor, who didn't weigh her because she was being followed closely by the health nurse, but our doctor is laid back about stuff like that. Stacey : Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies : not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others : have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped : and get a weight check? : Anne Niel was weighed about a half hour after birth, then not again until his 2 mos WBC. Larry > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of babies > not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered what others > have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do you visit the Ped > and get a weight check? I think here, the *standard* weight checks are at birth, at hospital discharge, and at Early Childhood Health Centre visits (it is also possible to drop in to your ECHC to have the baby weighed between official visits). In my area, there is supposed to be a home visit by the nurses in the first week; I presume there would be a weight check there too. There certainly was a period at my ECHC where the staff didn't plot the weight on the Blue Book graph, because parents were responding to low-but-healthy weights by resorting to formula/solids, but they're back to plotting them again. (The Blue Book is a log-term record of your child's health, held by the parents). SignatureChookie -- Sydney, Australia (Replace "foulspambegone" with "optushome" to reply) "... if *I* was buying a baby I'd jolly well make sure it was at least a two-tooth!" Mary Grant Bruce, The Houses of the Eagle. > I think here, the *standard* weight checks are at birth, at hospital > discharge, and at Early Childhood Health Centre visits (it is also [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > week; I > presume there would be a weight check there too. are you assuming all checks involve a weight check? I had some kind of check almost daily, though sometimes it was just a phone call, but no weight checks until almost 2 weeks. > There certainly was a period at my ECHC where the staff didn't plot the > weight [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > by > the parents). ours is a red book! Ann > Looking and Happy Hunters post and having had similar experience, of > babies not being weighed provided everything else is fine, I wondered > what others have experienced. Do they way babies daily in hospital? Do > you visit the Ped and get a weight check? > > Anne In hospital here we weigh them at birth (or while they are still in birthsuite), day 3 then day 5. Jo SignatureWoman, Wife, Mother, Midwife > In hospital here we weigh them at birth (or while they are still in > birthsuite), day 3 then day 5. do you know the logic behind that? Is that for term, well infants? Our hospital has some bad points and some good points, basically they really minimally intervene for well, term infants, which means no routine weighings post birth, but for all other infants, they then go crackers. I've chatted to mums who have had low birth weight but term babies and then have them weighed daily on the transitional care ward and then being stressed at because the baby has lost weight and having to repeatedly point out "but my milk hasn't come in yet". Then not letting them home, when literally the only problem is the baby was small at delivery. I can see the point when it is a first child as you don't know what normal, is, but for experienced mums, they really make life difficult, when they just want to go home and get on with life! Anne >> In hospital here we weigh them at birth (or while they are still in >> birthsuite), day 3 then day 5. > > do you know the logic behind that? Is that for term, well infants? I think it's to get an idea of how much they weigh at birth and then again after they've lost whatever "water weight" from the delivery. It might also be to keep track of the really tiny babies, because the smallest ones have extra risks with a lower weight. Jess >> In hospital here we weigh them at birth (or while they are still in >> birthsuite), day 3 then day 5. > > do you know the logic behind that? Is that for term, well infants? Ugh, you have to be kidding, right? Logic?? hehe Every baby gets weighed at birth, day 3 and day 5. These doctors are control freaks and like to know exact numbers. We are a baby friendly hospital, but depending on which paed is on for the day, what happens when a baby loses more than 10% and mum's milk isn't in yet. Some say just continue feeding 3 hourly and we always tell them the milk is on the way, breasts are firming up, etc. Others go down the formula topup road and expressing after every 3 hourly feed. If you're lucky enough to have one of these babies, you might even be lucky enough to score a day 4 weight as well! AND an extended hospital stay, because of course you don't really know what you are doing and don't really know how important it is that a baby be fed. *rolls eyes* Jo SignatureWoman, Wife, Mother, Midwife > Ugh, you have to be kidding, right? Logic?? hehe that was what I thought, I realise I was very lucky when I had my first, there is a breastfeeding counsellor at our hospital 2 hrs per week, she was there after DS was born, so instead of sending me to the formula cupboard when he didn't eat, they sent her instead. Also, I was on a drip in labour, so that probably pushed his weight over the 2.5kg mark, then by not being weighed on day 3 or whenever, we avoided him ever being weighed at under 2.5kg, which he almost certainly must have been at some point. Sucessful breastfeeding for us that time was basically luck not judgement! Anne > We are a baby friendly hospital, [snip] > Some say > just continue feeding 3 hourly and we always tell them the milk is on > the way, breasts are firming up, etc. Others go down the formula topup > road and expressing after every 3 hourly feed. BFH and 3 hourly schedules? I don't quite understand. Lara >> We are a baby friendly hospital, > [snip] [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > > Lara That's for a baby who has lost more than 10%, not just any baby. We have a demand feeding policy, but no longer than 6 hours between feeds. Jo SignatureWoman, Wife, Mother, Midwife > That's for a baby who has lost more than 10%, not just any baby. We have > a demand feeding policy, but no longer than 6 hours between feeds. ho ho, no wonder they got a bit panicy with me and DS, he slept for about 10 hrs straight! fwiw, so did Ada, but we were at home, so no one fussed us, I understand this is a quite normal reaction to being born Anne >> That's for a baby who has lost more than 10%, not just any baby. We >> have a demand feeding policy, but no longer than 6 hours between >> feeds. > > ho ho, no wonder they got a bit panicy with me and DS, he slept for > about 10 hrs straight! Yup, here too, except without the panic. YoungBloke born at 11.30am, didn't feed till about 8pm. Which was a shame because they didn't want to let us home till he'd fed. This was a certified breast-feeding friendly hospital and they wanted to make sure that we got off to a good start with BF, good latch etc. They knew I didn't want to spend my first night with him in hospital so they did everything they could to persuade him to wake up and nurse - expressing colostrum, undressing him, tickling his feet - and he wasn't having any of it... I was on their side, I too wanted to get BF off to a good start, so I didn't discharge myself, but oooh, if only he'd woken up two hours earlier! Interesting to see the variations in experience - Our daughter was 5 weeks last Friday. We moved into Hebden Bridge area, in West Yorkshire a month before she was born and a bit nervous to be changing the area we had gone thro all the preliminaries in. We had also seen the 'hue and cry' in National Press when the Royal Calderdale Hospital supposedly 'banned people smiling at babies' ( a very silly media storm-in-a -eacup - as it turned out!) Therefore we are only too happy to say what a completely wonderful service we have experienced since we arrived here: >From the midwife-team, to the ante-natal classes, to the help on the 'big day' from 3.30 am still hoping for a home-birth...through to 9.30/10 am when it became necessary to go to hospital - to the Royal Calderdale midwife (so young!) who was also superb. When the baby arrived at 1.30pm - she was (as we thought traditional) - weighed an hour or so later - after a lovely opportunity for me to hold the baby whilst awaiting delivery of the placenta. By 8pm after a quick trip home to empty the under-used 'birthing pool' - my husband returned and 'we' were discharged. Afetr the birth - the midwives continued with their incredible service - we could have seen them every day if we had wanted, for the first 30 days of our baby's life. As it was they came out once or twice a week - until we could go down to the drop-in session (only delayed by us being slow getting hold of a car seat for the little one!!). They were all so lovely and helpful, understanding - and helped put our 'first time parent' minds at rest about every lttle concern we had. After the first day or two of agony getting the milk flowing - getting the 'latching-on' sorted - getting the angle of delivery right - and recovering from some 'soreness' - the B/F came right and has been a wonderful experience which I fully intend to continue for the first year. The little one was weighed again about 9/10 day old - and having several ounces from her birth weight - we were assured that this was just perectly normal (especialy as the 'flow' for the first 3 days had seemed negligible - but apparently perfectly normal - even though the amounts of colostrum must have been miniscule!). As the Mid-wives phased out the 'Health Vistors' phased in. Again both lovely women who have been very supportive and encouraging. The little one was weighed again about 20 days - and was almost back to birth weight - and again last week, at just over one month - having put on almost two and a half pounds. We were interested to hear that breast-fed children put weight on more slowly (would say 'more naturally') - and that 'formula' supplementation can be negative because it can can lead to the breast milk stopping due to the lower demand - plus - one has to wonder at the fact that 'man-made' milk (rather than 'mum-made') usually results in faster weight gain - for us this seems the start of a slippery slope of fat-baby/fat-toddler/fat-child/fat-adult! The price we pay for being all too ready to introduce 'ready made' solutions as far as food goes from as soon as day1 in a persons life! What really comes home to us - as rather late starters with this 'family' thing - is that thanks to the brilliant support of the Midwife Team and the Health Visitors here in West Yorkshire - we have felt totally assured at all times, and educated about the wide spectrum of what is considered normal for the first few weeks of a baby's life. We are also heartened by the great support to get started successfully with B/F and stick to it without supplements or unneccessary alternatives - for as long as the milk flows, and the baby is happy (naturally we also recognize that sometimes Mums may not be able to provide milk - and in these cases then it is thankful that there are some products around that can help). The only time in the process of the birth, and the aftermath, that we were at all 'under pressure' was when we were visited 3 times in about 3/4 of an hour by the 'baby doctors' - trying to persuade us to accept a VitaminK jab (but it was our preference to rely on nature - and Mum's milk - and decline this 'sledge-hammer to crack a walnut approach to the issue of Infant Haemorragic Syndrome or whatever this very-low incidence problem is called!!). Once again the Midwives were very supportive over this issue. (Just as the Health Visitors have been in our early discussion about our lack of belief in vaccination.) It seems to us that whilst weighing a baby at birth can confirm those little ones that are way below acceptable birth-weight - and allows monitoring of their gains and progress - that weight is otherwise such a variable issue - there is no real wrong/right or perfect level of progress - and generally little need for frequent weighing. As long as a baby actually grows (which I think 'Mum' can tell both instinctively, and practically, from the day-to-day changes that are so noticeable during these early times). Sorry, I probably got carried away here - but I was just inspired to give credit where it is due - and in a UK National Health system that is much criticised, and much maligned - especially by our 'bad news media' - I wanted to say the system of support for expectant and new mothers (and fathers) here in Hebden Bridge - is absolutely fantastic! All the professionals we have met have been dedicated individuals, with great empathy and caring skills - or is it now called 'emotional intelligence' - They have been there for us at any time - and have been pro-active at keeping in touch and ensuring all was A-OK - As I say - absolutely fantastic. Ruth > Interesting to see the variations in experience - > [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > Calderdale Hospital supposedly 'banned people smiling at babies' ( a > very silly media storm-in-a -eacup - as it turned out!) *waves* from Walsden, just down the road. Calderdale midwives are *ace* - mine really worked with me to get a home birth until the point where it was obvious that YoungBloke wasn't shifting and I'd run out of push, then they came with me to the hospital, stayed throughout the delivery, and took OldBloke back home later so they could collect their kit and he could get the car. They visited, as you said, regularly, and the HVs have been v supportive of breastfeeding - mine is thrilled that I'm still going at 2 years plus. I think we're lucky to live in such a good area, when I hear from other people. Like your baby, YB was weighed about an hour after the birth and then again when he had his heel prick a few days later. He lost nearly 10% of his birthweight but there was no panic, just a confirmation that I was doing the right thing by feeding him. Next time he was weighed, around 10 days old, he'd gained a pound, and after that I chose to have him weighed not for peace of mind but because I was so astounded that he could gain so much in so short a space of time! |
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