Re: Slow weight gain
1. Adding or worse, substituting with, cereal does not make sense as mentioned by others, due to lack of calories
2. At birth your child was between 25 - 50 percentile and now is below the 5th percentile. This may or more likely, may not, be cause for concern. Do you have a weight for any other time between birth and 4.5 months? This will be very helpful.
3. Yes IV fluids can contribute to falsely elevated birth weights. This was the case for us, and it was a hellish nightmare convincing our ped that my son did not need formula on day 2 of life (he had a greater than 10% weight drop after birth, I told them to kiss my ***). Pediatricians need to learn to treat the child not the numbers.
4. Along that same line of thinking, is he a happy baby? This is very important. Is he fussy all day, how long are his stretches of sleep?
5. His poop frequency is not an issue. Up to 14 days (ridiculous huh) is considered normal.
6. I cannot see your baby in front of me, so my advice is limited, but I do feel your pain as I have been there in tears just fighting for my baby and his right to the milk that was created for him.
DS born 2/11: EBF for 11 months, BF for 4 years
DD born 11/14: came to the hospital crowning, had her the old fashioned way, EBF for almost 3 months and counting
Looking to adopt a toddler internationally in the next year or so...