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breastfeeding after gallbladder removal

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Irritable Bowel Syndrome
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Posted 8/5/2007 7:12 AM (GMT 0)
hi, its been two weeks now almost since i had my gallbladder removed. I breastfeed my 10 mnth old son and the last week he's had alot more dirty diapers. last couple of days he's had a high fever and green diarrhea. Anyone know if this could be related to my bile being all out of wack now that i dont have my gallbladder?
Posted 8/6/2007 2:47 PM (GMT 0)
I can't imagine that your bile should have anything to do with your breast milk. Sounds like he's got some sort of cold or stomach thing all on his own. While green/yellow poop is a sign of a problem in an adult, it's not an uncommon poop color in babies and can happen with or without any illness present (peas will make babies' poop green).

But yes, your bile is almost certainly out of whack so soon after surgery. Give your body 6 weeks to adjust. After that time, that's about as adjusted as it's going to be. There is a medicine that you can take if you have problems with bile diarrhea, but I specifically remember reading that it has not been tested on breast-feeding mothers, and even though you're not supposed to absorb it, you never can tell what will come out in breast milk. So you'd have to wait until you stopped breastfeeding to look into taking it. But you may be one of the lucky ones who adjusts okay to not having a gall bladder and won't need it.
Posted 8/10/2007 6:21 PM (GMT 0)
thanks for the info! we've been into his docs and she ruled that out as well. He did have bacteria come up in his urine sample from our hospital trip a couple of days ago but he had antibiotics for that. He still has diarrhea but we are trying to figure out why now..

i'm hoping to soon adjust to life without my gallbladder soon since it's hard for me to go out in public at all since i'm afraid i won't make it to the bathroom in time... i guess it's all just a wait and see right now :)

Posted 8/10/2007 9:24 PM (GMT 0)

Your son might have diarrhea because of his recent antibiotic use.  This is a notorious side-effect with any antibiotic.  I'm willing to bet it'll clear up on its own once the anbiotics are out of his system.

As far as you go, it'll get easier; you'll figure out your triggers and be able to make super-quick pit stops anywhere!  Let us know how it goes...

Posted 8/13/2007 5:13 AM (GMT 0)

thanks. that's what his pediatrician thinks too, but how long will it take to get antibiotics out of his system? he had them about 9 days ago. it was just a small IV drip on Friday night. So it wasn't more than one day on em.

I was researching some info to see if i could find anything on www.kellymom.com (great breastfeeding site) and i read about how u express bile-salt stimulated lipase in ur breast milk and it helps break down the fats in the milk for your baby. I then googled it to find any info. this is what i found

Bile salt-stimulated lipase (BSSL) is a LeX-carrying glycoprotein (27) secreted by the pancreas and activated by bile salts in the intestine. BSSL is also expressed by the mammary gland and present in human milk (4) at a concentration of between 100 and 200 μg/ml (42). Neonates normally secrete only small amounts of colipase-dependent pancreatic lipase into the duodenum (14), so gastric lipase as well as BSSL in human milk markedly enhances fat digestion in the newborn (3). Pancreatic BSSL and human milk BSSL were shown to be identical at the amino acid level (19, 31) while substantially varying in their carbohydrate contents (26, 43), with LeX being present at the C terminus of BSSL (20, 27). BSSL is also present in testes and adrenals (21) and blood plasma of humans (25). BSSL is produced by stimulated macrophages (22) and eosinophils (15), and its activity has been detected in endothelial cells (23), aortic homogenate (39), and human placenta (7).

So what i'm wondering is if this has anything to do with it.. i dunno i'm just searching cuz i noticed the two days i didnt go to the bathroom he had a solid poop instead of diarrhea... it's just weird coincidence.

Posted 8/13/2007 6:42 AM (GMT 0)

Hmm...that paragraph explained what BSSL is, but not how its presence may or may not have an effect on the baby's digestive tract clinically. 

You said your baby had two days of solid stools?  Were this recently?  Is he having diarrhea currently?

Posted 8/13/2007 2:32 PM (GMT 0)
Yes, it can take a number of days to get over antibiotics (does for me, at any rate).

I saw in the store Friday that Stoneyfield organic yogurt now has out a line of yogurt for babies called "Yo Baby!" Call your pediatrician to make sure that it's okay for him to eat at his age, but if so, try and get him to eating yogurt on a regular basis as a snack. It's good for the overall digestive tract of anyone.

Of course, if he gets this same problem again, you may want to try switching him over to formula. It seems weird that your bile levels would have something to do with you milk, but if it does indeed affect it, then it's probably worse to keep him on breastmilk than it is to switch. Is there a forum like this for breastfeeding where you could ask other mothers if they have noticed this same problem before? It's not uncommon for pregnancy to mess up the gall bladder and so there should be other women in your situation of breastfeeding without having a GB.
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