While it’s normal for babies to cry and fuss, some babies experience a greater degree of distress than others. If your baby cries for more than three hours a day, three days or more a week for more than three weeks, she may have colic.

Colic is especially difficult because it can cause a great deal of stress on a family. While there are no long term health effects of colic, the sheer mental agony can be very frustrating, especially for parents. Add in the fact that those parents are probably operating on a limited amount of sleep and you have a dangerous equation.

Colic is usually relatively easy to recognize. Here are the three identifying symptoms of colic:

• You can predict when your baby will cry. Very often (but not always) a baby with colic will cry around the same time each day. In many cases, this takes place in the afternoon or the evening. Each time your baby cries, it may last just a few minutes or it may last for three hours all at once. This crying will usually stop and start for no visible reason. Toward the end of the crying, your baby might have gas or a bowel movement.
• Your baby’s crying is inconsolable. Crying from colic is often high pitched, and may be hard or even impossible to comfort.
• Your baby changes posture significantly. Your baby’s legs are likely to curl up, her fists are likely to clench and she’s likely to tenser her abdominal muscles, as well, during a colic episode.

If you think your baby may have colic, it’s worth talking to your baby’s doctor. She can offer some advice about how to handle things, and in some cases may be able to identify whether there is a different issue causing the crying, such as a health concern that up to this point hasn’t been detected.

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