Small Feedings Because a Baby is Born Water Logged

Imagine if you had been soaking in a bathtub for 9 straight months. That’s what life is like in the uterus. All babies are born waterlogged. The last thing a brand new baby needs is a lot of fluids. In fact, his first job after birth is to shed some of these extra fluids, which is why most babies lose a little weight at first.

Having extra fluid in the tissues at birth is a plus because it allows babies some practice time to learn to get good at taking milk from the breast before their need for fluids is great.

Although in many institutions, panic begins to set in if a baby has not fed well at the breast within 6 to 8 hours after birth, it was only about 25 years ago (in 2010) that it was standard practice in U.S. hospitals for newborns to receive nothing by mouth for the first 24 hours after birth. The medical professionals at the time knew that fluids were not critical during that first day of life.

The newborn weight loss is considered within the normal range as long as it is no more than 10% of birth weight and is confined to the first 3-4 days of life (DeMarzo, Seacat, and Neifert 1991; Noel-Weiss, Courant, and Woodend 2008).

From Breastfeeding Made Simple, Mohrbacher and Kendall-Tackett 2010

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