Nursing to Sleep Q: Are you Burping your Baby?

@evall Less and less as she gets older (7 months now), but I also tried to follow her cues. If she is sleeping peacefully I don’t burp, if wiggly and struggling to fall asleep I burp her and then sometimes feed more to sleep or rock her to sleep
 
@miullawd Nice to hear this, I would say I’ve been doing the same these days. Trying to go off her cues. However I find that I’m afraid to miss some sneaky gas…not sure why? Some PRSD /”post-reflux stress disorder” perhaps?? Lol
 
@evall Aww yeah I feel that too. Sometimes if I’m worried I’ll rock her/walk around with her upright sleeping on my chest and that’s enough to get her to burp without disturbing her too much, I wanna say after 3/4 months or so it sometimes worked without actually patting her back
 
@evall There is a trick my doula showed me that worked 99% of the time: when baby is done nursing, be sure to support their head and neck very firmly with one hand (the one opposite to the arm they are laying on) and then move your arm to bring them to an almost sitting position. You can do this very slowly and discreetly (mine never woke up in process). He would burped almost immediately, and if not I would just bring a bit further into “sitting” and that was it.

This was perfect for night feeds, but I used it almost every time during the day as well.
 
@evall Sometimes. It's like you said a hard decision. Sometimes she will get really wriggly and fussy until she burps. Other times just leaving her lying down let's her sleep so I don't have to rock her back to sleep. It's like a catch 22.
 
@evall Yes reading all these comments about people who don't burp really blows my mind! Our baby is really gassy and has reflux, if I didn't burp him we would be in big trouble. Even sometimes if I don't get a little burp out because we fall asleep after side laying nursing, he wakes up 10 or 15 minutes later crying and it immediately when I go to burp him it comes out. I'm hoping he outgrows the reflux soon so that like you're asking, our night time nursing can be a little more peaceful.
 
@joeparis123 Right?? Blows my mind too! Those 2nd wake-ups to burp can be sooo disruptive to the night, since they are waking up uncomfortable.

It’s like we have to choose between either waking them up right away to burp (after they’ve drifted off on the boob,) or put them down and risk a 2nd wake up to burp. No way to know for sure, and that 2nd wake up is no fun for mom or baby!!

I’d say I’m still in the trial-and-error period with our girl. She is slowly outgrowing it now, at 3.5 months. But we’re not over the hill yet by any means!
 
@evall 6 months in and I only burped at night if she was uncomfortable which wasn't often. She was a super gassy baby and still is a bit.
 
@evall I still burp my 4 mo at night, but not over the shoulder, just hold him sitting on my lap, side of his head resting on my chest a bit and gently burp and shush in the same time.
 
@evall I almost never have burped either of my babies after breastfeeding. I did try a little more at the beginning when they are younger which is convenient because they actually sleep through more and as they get older and harder to put to sleep I believe they need the burping less and can work out their own gas.

Really I could never get any burps after breastfeeding. I do think it is useful after bottles but now I can't remember to do it usually even after that and we are fine.
 

Similar threads

Back
Top