Constipation, as such, refers to infrequent bowel movements. However, baby constipation is somewhat different from adults. How to know whether your baby is having constipation or not? If your child has gone without bowel movements for quite a few days and is then passing out hard poop, he or she might be having constipation. Constipation doesn’t simply depend on the duration between poops but also the consistency.
How to Prevent Baby Constipation?
There are a few natural or prescribed ways to prevent constipation.
- Make your baby exercise a bit daily.
- Massage his or her belly lightly.
- If your baby is older than a month, make him or her drink a little prune juice along with breast milk or formula diet.
The next question buzzing on your mind must be ‘what if’. What if your baby is constipated? Do you need to rush to the Doctor at once with your babe’s empty diapers? Is baby constipation really serious?
The answer is no. Your infant is still a newly born flower slowly adjusting to the sunlight. He or she is getting used to new food items daily through the breast milk that he or she sucks. So, it’s normal for them to take a longer time in getting some extra foreign foods turned into poop.
What are the signs that your baby is constipated?
These are the red alerts that you should look out for when you suspect baby constipation.
- When baby is crying, screaming or showing other relevant signs of discomfort before or during pooping.
- Dry, hard lumps of poop that are hard to pass out.
- Foul smell of the poop, which denotes greater time of the feces spent in the gut.
- Less than three bowel movements in 7 days.
- Tough protruding belly.
- Less than normal appetite.
Ways to Relieve Baby Constipation
There are a few tips that you can follow to relieve your baby from constipation. Some are:
- Increase your baby’s daily dose of water consumption.
- Give him or her a bath in lukewarm water.
- Make him or her do the ‘bicycle legs’ exercise. This helps very often to ease baby constipation.
- Also feed him or her foods with higher degree of roughage.
