(Doubles his or her birth weight by six months.)
One Year:
Approximate average: Two and a half to three times his or her birth
weight.
Spitting-Up Concerns
The reader will meet Whitney and her son Micah in chapter nine. Their
story provides insights into the causes of excessive spitting up. While we
will not address the matter in detail here, we wish to alert you to this
condition. It is normal for babies to spit up after feeding. But is your baby
spitting up excessively, five, ten or twenty times a feeding? Take note of
this and inform your pediatrician. Excessive spitting up may be a
symptom of a digestive problem.
Babies Who Fail to Thrive
There is a difference between slow weight gain and failure to thrive. With
slow weight gain, weight gain is slow but consistent. Failure to thrive
describes an infant who continues to lose weight after ten days of life,
does not regain his or her birth weight by three weeks of age, or gains at
an unusually slow rate beyond the first month. It’s estimated that in the
United States, more than two hundred thousand babies a year experience
failure to thrive. The cause can be attributed to either mother or child.
Mother-Related Causes
Here are some matters specific to mother that can contribute to slow or
no weight gain.
- Improper nursing technique. Many women fail at breast-feeding
because the baby is not positioned properly on the breast. As a result, he
or she latches on only to the nipple and not to all or much of the areola.