Reflux baby and feeling down

We just figured out that our baby has reflux less than a week ago and while it's nice to now know WHY he's crying out like we're putting cigaretts out on him - it's frustrating to realise how much different he is to other babies.

What's really got me down: I went to my antenatal coffee group yesterday. All our babies are very close to the same age and they were all talking about how they read to their baby or how much their baby enjoys their playgym/looking at things around the market, and how much they smile/giggle.

I was sitting there feeling absolutely horrible because I do very little of that with Ryan due to the fact that most of my day is spent either trying to comfort him when he's having a reflux attack and screaming his little head off or trying to calm him down to go to sleep because he's overtired from screaming for so long. He hates his carseat and his stroller because he's scrunched or reclined and it makes his reflux worse and he doesn't get good sleep because of the same thing. I can pretty much only take him out when he's in his Moby wrap as he's upright and falls asleep.

Ryan also rarely smiles - probably because he's usually in pain and that hurts as well.

I feel proud if I can get Ryan to be under his playgym for 10 minutes out of the day. He usually starts screaming afterwards due to being on his back. I can exactly read to him as he wouldn't hear me through his crying...It's so incredibly frustrating to feel like (1) you're being lazy (even though I know I'm not) and (2) that Ryan's missing out on things.

Does anyone else feel like this? Just needing some support at the moment.

to you. Remember you are doing a great job.

A friend of ours had the same and she imported some cot rockers from Australia which made a HUGE difference to his sleeping - the motion was what he enjoyed. In the beginning the only way she could get him to sleep was on her! She also found a dummy worked well. Our girl had reflux as well but never took to a dummy. Hang in there it does get better

You could also try propping him up under the playgym .. Elias is propped up everywhere (bed, changetable etc) as he brings everything up otherwise

i bet you the other mums are exagerating slightly anyway... and you having him in the moby is much better for him than a pram... and can you say over stimulation! lol! try not to feel bad...hes only very little and you have lots of fun stuff coming

I must admit - I don't know whether we're lucky or not - but Ryan has silent reflux so he very very rarely vomits - it's just the screaming. Since doing sleeps on his tummy at night and like Saffron suggested propping him up on a breastfeeding pillow and cutting out dairy we have had a much happier child with far fewer reflux episodes. I can only hope that we have a child who's reflux will get better sooner rather than later.

Big milestone last night - Ryan decided he now likes his dummy. Oh the joy!!! It is so much easier to settle him at night, in the carseat, during a reflux attack - you name it. Before it was like he had no idea what to do with the darn thing but now he attacks it like it's his last hope and he settles right down. Bliss.

I am really really hoping that Ryan's reflux is actually getting better. He seems so much happier since he's been able to get decent naps and I have been able to cut down his Gaviscon intake from the maximum to half that amount. Fingers crossed.

Daniel had silent reflux. Some days were very hard. One thing I wish someone had told me is that once you find something that works for him, it may not always work, we found gaviscon like a brilliant cure for it, but it only lasted a week before we had to move to ranitidine. I wish I had known that then I would have gone straight back to the doc immediately and it would have saved us from some horrid days. I don't know if that is helpful or not but just make sure you keep going back to the GP if you feel something doesn't work. Silent reflux is awful!

But they do grow out of it!