Infant Poop - Everything You Need to Know

Infant poop can tell parents a lot about an infant's well-being and whether his feeding is going well or not. It can also tell whether the infant is properly tolerating the food or whether he is allergic to it. Therefore, it would be essential for parents to pay close attention to their baby's feces. What a baby's poop looks like, smells like, its frequency and the behavior that comes with it are all essential factors that parents need to watch out for.

What It Looks Like

The stools of a newborn baby start of as slimy and black, but quickly become dark green before they turn yellow after their first life's week is over. The stool consistency will also change to watery, seedy, pasty or loose. If babies feed well during this first week, their poop will change to yellow in an instant, whereas babies who do not feed well will remain having sticky and green poop. Breast-fed babies should end up having watery and loose stools with consistencies of runny eggs, while formula-fed babies should end up having pasty toothpaste-like stools. Once babies start to eat baby food, this consistency and color should change to orange, yellow, or green, depending on the food that they eat.

What It Smells Like

Poop of newborn babies do not smell like anything. The scent evolves once the baby grows older as regular intestinal bacteria grow inside him. The stools of breast-fed babies don't smell like anything, while those of formula-fed babies give off some odor. After baby food gets introduced, the smell will earnestly develop and disposable stool bags will definitely be needed.

Its Frequency

Newborn babies tend to give off stools very frequently and this could happen after each feeding. This is not the same as diarrhea. It happens because babies are on liquid diets, so not a lot of debris is left over to create stool materials. After a few weeks, stools of breast-fed infants get less frequent since they use up the majority of the nutrients without leaving a lot of it left over. It would be totally for normal infants of up to eight weeks old to only poop once a week. Conversely, formula-fed babies might only poop one time every four days because their formula doesn't get to break down into usable nutrients as fast as breast milk. The stool consistency and frequency will change once baby food gets introduced.

The Behavior That Comes with It

Babies tend to show some interesting behaviors during bowel movements. Since a baby's muscle tones aren't too strong yet, they have to bear down a lot when it comes to number two. Their faces will crinkle up and go red while they grunt, moan or cry out; and right after they are done, they will stop and return to normal.

All of these things are normal when it comes to infant poop. The only abnormal signs you need to watch out for would be blood, excessive mucus and white poop before calling up your pediatrician.