It is well known that when a baby is born start losing weight and he continues doing it in the first days until with the food he receives he begins to stop losing and begins to gain it.
That loss is completely normal, however it has a limit that should not be exceeded because that would put the baby's life at risk. In other words: there comes a time when yes or yes you have to start gaining weight.
To find out if our baby has already begun to lose too much weight or if he is recovering well, as desired, the Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital has published a more than useful online tool.
But why do they lose weight?
The three reasons why babies, despite being fed on demand since birth, lose weight, are the following:
- The expulsion of the meconium: After a few hours after the babies are born, they expel their first poop, the meconium, a viscous, dark, sticky substance, and I could even say that it is difficult to clean, as a result of everything the baby has been swallowing during pregnancy. Actually, the following poops will also be of a similar appearance, so it is estimated that the baby comes with 90 grams of meconium in his intestines that of course, by eliminating them, make the baby lose weight.
- Baby's urine: They not only poop, but also pee, and not only once, but several times a day. Through urine, and perhaps also through sweat, they lose fluid and weight.
- They still eat little: at birth they stop receiving nutrients through the umbilical cord and yet they are consuming energy just because they live. Even if a baby moves a little and sleeps a lot, his body needs energy, and at first they don't eat too much. It is not an error, it must be like that.
The baby's stomach is receiving food for the first time and at the time of birth it begins to colonize with the flora it receives in its first contacts with the outside and that will help it digest what it eats.
At first have to eat little (but on demand, nature already takes care of it). If you are drinking artificial milk you will not have colostrum, but the norm is the same: a newborn can not take more than 10 ml per dose on the first day, so it will not be enough to prevent weight loss.
"Newborn Weight Loss Tool"
To help parents to find out what is normal and what is not, because excessive loss would be dangerous, we have this online tool with which in a few seconds we can know if everything is going well, or if we could need medical help.
To obtain the data we have to enter the weight of the baby at birth ("Birth Weight") in kg or grams, the date of birth ("Birth date") and the time it was born, because the calculation is made by hours.
Then we mark if the delivery was vaginal or by caesarean section and what food you are receiving, whether breast or artificial milk.
Finally, to know the current moment, we add the weight, date and time in "Additional Measurement". After pressing "Graph it" we will see the graph that will tell us in what percentile of weight gain is the baby: if it is in the green it means that it goes on the average, if it is above, it means that it is earning more than the average, and below the green it is that it is earning less than the average. The colors indicate how important it is that something begins to be done to improve this gain (from orange it is clear that there is a problem).
Once the graph is made, we can press "Add new" and add the weight at other times. That way we can see the evolution the baby is carrying.
In addition, it will tell us what percentage of weight the baby has lost, which is a very important fact. It is often said that Normally, they lose between 5% and 7% of the newborn's weight, accepting a maximum limit 10% they should no longer reach (to reach 7-8%, we must act to avoid reaching that 10%).
And what do you do if you are gaining little weight?
Seek expert help; see if there is a problem with the sucking of the baby to the breast or a problem with the production of breast milk; see if you are eating well, enough, and if so, look for a problem in the baby, in case you could be suffering some kind of infection (Urine infections are common, which consume much of the calories they receive and make them not gain weight or even lose it.)
Once the problems are known, the appropriate solutions are carried out so that the scare is left alone in that and the baby can finally get fat as it should.
Photos | iStock
In Babies and more | The baby loses weight at birth: how much and why ?, The first days with the baby: weight and height at birth, Physiological loss, How to know if the baby drinks enough breast milk: weight
