Okay, now I really feel discouraged...

[@llli*melanija]

My DD is 6 monts old and she is a fussy little thing. She is teething (she has 1 tooth and the second one is coming through), but she was fussy since birth. I really don't know what to do. It's really hard to keep BF, because she doesn't seem happy. Her weight gain is fine, but she seems so unhappy most of the time. She doesn't play by herself at all and even when we try to play with her, it's extremely difficult to keep her from fussing. I thought she has dairy allergy, so I didn't eat anything with obvious and hidden dairy products. I was dairy free for 2 months, there was no obvious change.
I really don't know what's wrong with her. I offer her my breast everytime she fusses, which means every hour, or more often. When she naps, then it's more like every 2 hours. And usually she nurses, when I offer. Well, at least a minute or so. I have NO idea how often she nurses.
Can she be teething so long and if she is, how come nothing that should help with het teething pain, doesn't help?
What should I do? It's so difficult to see that I am doing great job nursing, cause she isn't a happy baby. I get tired with entertaining her for an hour. I barely survive whole day with her. What's wrong with her? Her pediatrican isn't concerned as she seems fine, she is gaining well. Should I push him harder?

[LEMPENN]

Hi there - my DD was just like this til 6 1/2 months old - miserable as sin all the time and never more so than when I tried to feed her! Then almost overnight she stopped fussing at the breast and nursed happily. I never managed to work our why but at 1 yr she's still feeding and I now feel that all those blissful descrptions of breastfeeding make sense (they sure as hell never used to!) Hang on in there - you've come this far and you could come out the other side any day now. You've done so well to keep things up with a baby who fuses and fights you but things will get better!

[saraswathi]

Is it possible that she has silent reflux? I wonder too, if she's getting enough sleep. It helped me to watch a video showing tired signs in infants, because I was making the mistake of trying to play with my daughter or feed her, when she was really just over-stimulated and tired. Once they get past that optimal sleep-window, it can be hard to get them down. They still need a lot of sleep at that age.
It is definitely much, much easier once those teeth appear...they can start to move in the jaw and cause pain before there are obvious signs of teething, and it can take a couple of months from the first sign of teething until the first teeth come through. Go with your gut - parenting is tough, but it shouldn't be impossible. If you're feeling like you can't cope, talk with your ped. again or your own GP.

[@llli*aprilsmagic]

Mine was really fussy too, starting at birth. Turned out he had acid reflux, even though he hardly ever spit up.

I dealt with it pretty much the same way your are -- offering to nurse. If that didn't make him settle down, we sat in the rocking chair, and I rocked for hours. Or I put him in the sling and walked. He was better if we could get out of the house.

Watch carefully for signs of tiredness. Looking back, I was not very good at figuring that out.

Teeth move in the jaw months before they pop through. It can be very frustrating. Nothing much worked for us either. I just kept on doing what should help -- Advil/Tylenol, cold chewy things, Hyland's teething tabs, stuff like that -- in hopes. He didn't get his first tooth until 9+ months so it was a long time.

A LOT of his fussiness went away when he could sit up and play with some toys on his own. That was so wonderful that I actually scrapbooked a picture of it. I never thought that day would come.

But don't measure BF success by your baby's perceived happiness. A friend of mine did child-led weaning, and she said her baby never seemed happy, and she thought about giving up several times. That girl is a great kid now -- headstrong, but very independent and a lot of fun. It's sometimes just their personality at first.

[@llli*molly.b]

My DD was very fussy at that age (and earlier) also. She has been much happier since she started crawling, and now walking.
I agree with what the pp’s said about sleep, and I believe that establishing a flexible routine based on your child’s own natural patterns can be helpful to make sure she is getting enough sleep.
From the child’s perspective, she may simply be bored, not hungry. She is getting to the age where she has started noticing the world beyond your breast! My DD always loved (and still loves) field trips. Some kind of routine helps here also because you don’t want to be taking your baby out and overstimulating her when she is tired.

[@llli*moose]

I had and still sometimes have a fussy baby. We like to call her "high needs" because it doesn't sound so negative, and it made us feel better describing her that way to our friends and family. Anyway...Dr. Sears has a great book that we got about fussy babies. Here is a website with a lot of the info:

http://www.askdrsears.com/html/5/T051200.asp

Anyway...in there he actually described our dd to perfection--she is a needy child who also doesn't like to be cuddled. He says those are the most difficult. There were times when I really felt like I was going to lose it--I mean, for the first time in my life I could actually empathize with mothers who shook their babies (even though I never came that close, I could at least feel for them). Sometimes my nerves were so frayed I just had to put her in her crib and walk away, just to get a breathe of fresh air.

She also started teething at about 2.5 months--popped her first tooth, a molar, at 3 months but it settled back in. It comes up and goes back down on a regular basis, but no teeth have stayed put yet, and she is almost 8 months old.

Do you have a sling or carrier? That was my saving grace--that's the only way I got anything done. It wasn't until about 6 months that I could carry her in the maya wrap in the hip carrier, but she loved it. She hated it before that, but now, its wonderful. She like the baby bjorn, but I found it didn't really help me to get anything done because she was always in the way.

And finding a sleep pattern is extremely important. If Haylee is tired, everyone pays!!! We had such a hard time getting her to sleep--she slept in the swing for naps until she was about 6 months (we have one of those fisher price side to side swings that worked great). About that time, it stopped working, and she absolutely would not rock to sleep (again I say she hated to be cuddled) so I would put her in the crib and sit with her, not lifting her out of it, no matter how hard she cried. I would comfort her, by rubbing her head or shushing her, but not pick her up. Now, most of the time we just lay her in there and she goes to sleep right away.

It was soooo hard to go through. I totally understand your pain right now, but giving up breastfeeding is certainly not the answer. If she indeed does have a sensitive tummy, formula will most likely make it worse.

You are in my thoughts right now, for sure. Take care and let us know how things are going!