The Transformation of Wilma!

Back in March this year, a client asked me to host a consultation with her brother and sister-in-law who were really struggling with their then, 4 month old.

Fast forward to today and this is the update from Kate:

“Hi Alison, hope you’re doing well. I keep meaning to message you, but worried I’ll jinx things when I do 😂 I just wanted to say thank you so much for all your help. Wilma has improved so much, she’s such a happy little girl now and sleeps through most nights. You’ve done such an incredible job, we have our lives and our sanity back ! I’ve been telling everyone how amazing you are!”

When Kate initially contacted me, this was what she highlighted on her booking form;

History of problems and current issues: – disrupted night sleeping

• between 3–7 night wakes
• screaming sometimes like she’s in pain
• messy nap routine where she only really sleeps on me
• trapped wind
• can take 2h to get to sleep sometimes
• exclusive breast feeding.

We discussed all the issues listed above – and much more, after which I gave advice on how to try and improve things, reduce night feeding and promote better sleep. Kate felt she had a plan and set about trying to implement change over the next little while.

Sadly though, by the end April things had not improved but had in fact, deteriorated considerably.

They had during this time, been prescribed liquid Omeprazole and Neocate LCP to supplement breast feeding, but Wilma wouldn’t even take a bottle let alone the Neocate and she just spat out the liquid omeprazole- so things were tricky to say the least.

Poor Wilma was in quite a bad way and cried nearly non-stop, day and night. She hardly slept, constantly fed, was scratching her face, had red and blotchy skin & rashes, awful nappies, loads of snot and mucous and the whole family was utterly miserable, exhausted and at the end of their tether.

Luckily, I had some space in my diary and was able to slot in a 3 day visit to go and help them.

My plan was to remove the breast feeding, which although tough, Kate was ready to do as she was just too exhausted to carry on and her mental health was beginning to suffer. Of course, with Wilma refusing a bottle this was not going to be an easy journey. I had also advised to switch the liquid medicine to the dispersive tablet form – Losec Mups which is much easier to administer and sweetened with pear purée, is almost quite palatable by comparison.

Once I arrived I reorganised the bedroom arrangements and set up the proper cot in Wilma’s nursery and planned to get her sleeping in there as opposed to to the same room and often bed as mum and dad.

As predicted, Wilma refused the first bottle of Neocate but I did manage to get her to sleep for a nap in her cot. It wasn’t easy and took 15 minutes to get Wilma to calm down and then, with much bottom patting I got her to sleep 😴. She woke after 45 minutes, but I persevered and got her back to sleep and she then slept for another 90 minutes. This was the first time in her cot, in her room and she had not been breastfed to sleep – a huge change and a very positive start.

As you can see from the pic, she was so full of mucous and snot that she could only mouth breathe when asleep, but thankfully as her system cleansed itself the mucous production began to diminish.

It took a huge amount of patience and perseverance over the next couple of days, but Wilma did start to accept the bottle and began drinking small amounts of the milk. As her milk intake was still low, I upped her solid food quality and quantity to compensate ensuring all her food was allergen free, freshly cooked and not processed or shop bought in anyway.

By the time I left Wilma was quite happily going to bed for naps and nighttime, sleeping through the night but with just small feed around 2am and taking increasing amounts of milk during the day.

Over the next week, things continued to improve and Kate was able to stop the night feed completely and Wilma was happily sleeping 12 hours through the night, napping easily, downing full bottles of Neocate, enjoying her food and loving life – she was like a completely different baby!!

“Wilma is so happy now she gets her sleep! And no longer on omeprazole and can drink dairy with no problems 😄 Thank you again xx🩷”