I went to a baby shower once and was mortified to hear the other mothers talking about how hard it was to feed their babies balanced meals of baby food and eight bottles of water a day, in addition to bottles of breastmilk they pumped at work, like they were miniature adults. These were tiny babies of 3-4 months. Where did their moms get the idea that babies should have the same diet as adults, just mashed up? Babies don't need baby food. I can't tell you the specific sources that contributed to this revelation because I read so many things, but at some point I realized that there is no biological reason for the baby food aisle to exist.
Breastmilk is complete nutrition for babies. No buts. In fact, if you supplement with other foods, you will be giving your baby less nutrition and their feeling of fullness will reduce their inclination to nurse, subsequently reducing your supply. It has all the nutrients, proteins, and all the water they need for six months.
What it doesn't have is much iron. Babies are born with enough in their systems to last about six months. Then they need a little extra. This is the point when doctors offer supplements. I tend to think that supplements should be saved for when things are really wrong. If the drop in iron is normal, there must be a natural solution. Fortunately, this is also the point when their little pincher grasp develops, showing that they are ready to eat Cheerios and raisins cut in half. You cut the raisins in half because you don't want to see them come out the other end rehydrated. Mix them together in a Tupperware snack cup and keep it in the diaper bag for snacking. They won't need that much to bring their iron levels up. They have tiny little bodies.
Aside from that, eating in the first year is more about the sensory and social experiences. That scene with the baby being fed baby food in the high chair in the kitchen, before everyone else comes to dinner, should never happen. Sitting down with the family is essential to their social development. Bits of soft food from the table, or food cut small enough to prevent choking, provide new sensory experiences that help their oral sensitivity to taste and texture develop. Baby food, even home made baby food, doesn't really do this. They use their fingers to eat at first, then experiment with spoons. Babies can even be trained directly to regular cups at this point if someone helps them take sips of water. Since they should still be primarily breast feeding, there should be no nutritional concerns about whether they're getting enough of anything. And no pressure to finish what you prepare for them.
Gradually, what they eat at the table will increase, and the amount of breastmilk they take will decrease until a smooth transition off of the breast can be made. When I had to stop nursing my first at 18 months, before she was ready, the pain of engorgement was excruciating. When I transitioned my second at 18 months, she was already mostly done with me and I had no engorgement at all. The surgeon general recommends at least one year of breast feeding, but if you think of the cessation of breast feeding as a transition to regular food, it could be much later than that. You'll know when your baby is ready because their interest in breast feeding wanes and they can be easily distracted from it by the offer of other foods.
So, why does that baby food aisle exist? Because women with newborns are vulnerable to marketing. Especially any marketing that implies baby needs something. Because we don't understand our bodies well enough to be confident in our ability to nourish our own babies, they can wedge their marketing messages into the tiny cracks in our self confidence and pry them wide open. Remember that Nestlé convinced women in Africa that formula was superior to breastmilk, and their babies started dying from contaminates in the available water supply they used to mix it with. These companies don't care about infant nutrition. They care about sales. Balanced meals of organic non-gmo gluten free baby food, are still inferior nutrition to continued breastfeeding. Even though you know that, their commercials will make you cry. They've perfected their tactics. You might have to enlist your partner's support in helping you resist. They're not as hormonally involved.
Just because breastfeeding is natural, that doesn't mean it's always easy. Most women need some help getting started. That's not some freak change that has only occurred recently. Women five hundred years ago needed help too. They just got it from their mothers and grandmothers rather than from lactation specialists and nurses. It will absorb your life in the beginning, but what's a year given over to the maternal process?
Apparently, that is asking too much of most women. I would estimate that about ninety percent of the issues I've seen women have with breast feeding come down to stress over trying to be and do other things during that critical time in their child's development. American women are under way to much pressure to get back to "normal" after having a baby. Statistically, seventy percent of those who begin breast feeding will give up after six weeks, and ninety percent by three months. If it gets too hard there's always formula. The problem is that breastmilk is not just about nutrition.
Studies in the last decade suggest that emotional development begins in utero where the baby is exposed to the same hormones that the mother's emotional reactions to life flood her body with. That emotions, to some chemical extent, travel through the blood stream and cross the placenta. That a rich emotional environment in utero helps brain development. This continues through breast feeding, where those same hormones are present in the milk supply.
Any mother who has breastfed can tell you that if they're stressed, baby is stressed. If they're stimulated, baby is hyper. If mom can keep calm and happy, baby will be more calm and happy. Colic is self perpetuating in that it stresses mom out and begins a spiral of stressed milk, stressed baby, more stressed mom. Sometimes, she can break that cycle by stepping back and being intentional about calming herself for a prolonged period. But that takes time, and giving yourself over to that maternal process.
It can be hard. Really, really, really hard sometimes. And I would never want any woman to feel bad about giving up. I get it. I've spent a total of 5.5 years breast feeding my four daughters and I know the struggle. I know that I had a great deal more support to do so than many women have in our modern age. But I've heard women say, "why bother when they're going to be on baby food in six months?" I want women to understand that baby food is a modern marketing invention. They don't need to spend a fortune on it any more than they do formula. Their bodies are more than adequate. They were made to nourish their children for much longer than they probably think. And that the emotional symbiosis and physical connection are more important factors than they may realize.
Please don't feel bad about it if you were unable to breastfeed your children. We can only ever move forward. I think sometimes I only managed to continue out of sheer stubbornness. But I firmly believe that any woman can breastfeed if she gets the proper support. That providing that support should be important to all of us for public health reasons. That we need to give women in our society permission to just be moms for a full year if we want a physically and emotionally healthier population in the future.
We are rather unique among developed nations in the pressure we place on new moms to return to the normal life they had before giving birth. Having children changes us and we need time to define a new normal. More women, strong enough to resist the marketing that says products are as as good as parents, strong enough to speak out and say we need support and we need time and space to be mothers, will be the agents for this much needed change in our culture. I'm going to be one of them. Will you join me?
Breastmilk is complete nutrition for babies. No buts. In fact, if you supplement with other foods, you will be giving your baby less nutrition and their feeling of fullness will reduce their inclination to nurse, subsequently reducing your supply. It has all the nutrients, proteins, and all the water they need for six months.
What it doesn't have is much iron. Babies are born with enough in their systems to last about six months. Then they need a little extra. This is the point when doctors offer supplements. I tend to think that supplements should be saved for when things are really wrong. If the drop in iron is normal, there must be a natural solution. Fortunately, this is also the point when their little pincher grasp develops, showing that they are ready to eat Cheerios and raisins cut in half. You cut the raisins in half because you don't want to see them come out the other end rehydrated. Mix them together in a Tupperware snack cup and keep it in the diaper bag for snacking. They won't need that much to bring their iron levels up. They have tiny little bodies.
Aside from that, eating in the first year is more about the sensory and social experiences. That scene with the baby being fed baby food in the high chair in the kitchen, before everyone else comes to dinner, should never happen. Sitting down with the family is essential to their social development. Bits of soft food from the table, or food cut small enough to prevent choking, provide new sensory experiences that help their oral sensitivity to taste and texture develop. Baby food, even home made baby food, doesn't really do this. They use their fingers to eat at first, then experiment with spoons. Babies can even be trained directly to regular cups at this point if someone helps them take sips of water. Since they should still be primarily breast feeding, there should be no nutritional concerns about whether they're getting enough of anything. And no pressure to finish what you prepare for them.
Gradually, what they eat at the table will increase, and the amount of breastmilk they take will decrease until a smooth transition off of the breast can be made. When I had to stop nursing my first at 18 months, before she was ready, the pain of engorgement was excruciating. When I transitioned my second at 18 months, she was already mostly done with me and I had no engorgement at all. The surgeon general recommends at least one year of breast feeding, but if you think of the cessation of breast feeding as a transition to regular food, it could be much later than that. You'll know when your baby is ready because their interest in breast feeding wanes and they can be easily distracted from it by the offer of other foods.
So, why does that baby food aisle exist? Because women with newborns are vulnerable to marketing. Especially any marketing that implies baby needs something. Because we don't understand our bodies well enough to be confident in our ability to nourish our own babies, they can wedge their marketing messages into the tiny cracks in our self confidence and pry them wide open. Remember that Nestlé convinced women in Africa that formula was superior to breastmilk, and their babies started dying from contaminates in the available water supply they used to mix it with. These companies don't care about infant nutrition. They care about sales. Balanced meals of organic non-gmo gluten free baby food, are still inferior nutrition to continued breastfeeding. Even though you know that, their commercials will make you cry. They've perfected their tactics. You might have to enlist your partner's support in helping you resist. They're not as hormonally involved.
Just because breastfeeding is natural, that doesn't mean it's always easy. Most women need some help getting started. That's not some freak change that has only occurred recently. Women five hundred years ago needed help too. They just got it from their mothers and grandmothers rather than from lactation specialists and nurses. It will absorb your life in the beginning, but what's a year given over to the maternal process?
Apparently, that is asking too much of most women. I would estimate that about ninety percent of the issues I've seen women have with breast feeding come down to stress over trying to be and do other things during that critical time in their child's development. American women are under way to much pressure to get back to "normal" after having a baby. Statistically, seventy percent of those who begin breast feeding will give up after six weeks, and ninety percent by three months. If it gets too hard there's always formula. The problem is that breastmilk is not just about nutrition.
Studies in the last decade suggest that emotional development begins in utero where the baby is exposed to the same hormones that the mother's emotional reactions to life flood her body with. That emotions, to some chemical extent, travel through the blood stream and cross the placenta. That a rich emotional environment in utero helps brain development. This continues through breast feeding, where those same hormones are present in the milk supply.
Any mother who has breastfed can tell you that if they're stressed, baby is stressed. If they're stimulated, baby is hyper. If mom can keep calm and happy, baby will be more calm and happy. Colic is self perpetuating in that it stresses mom out and begins a spiral of stressed milk, stressed baby, more stressed mom. Sometimes, she can break that cycle by stepping back and being intentional about calming herself for a prolonged period. But that takes time, and giving yourself over to that maternal process.
It can be hard. Really, really, really hard sometimes. And I would never want any woman to feel bad about giving up. I get it. I've spent a total of 5.5 years breast feeding my four daughters and I know the struggle. I know that I had a great deal more support to do so than many women have in our modern age. But I've heard women say, "why bother when they're going to be on baby food in six months?" I want women to understand that baby food is a modern marketing invention. They don't need to spend a fortune on it any more than they do formula. Their bodies are more than adequate. They were made to nourish their children for much longer than they probably think. And that the emotional symbiosis and physical connection are more important factors than they may realize.
Please don't feel bad about it if you were unable to breastfeed your children. We can only ever move forward. I think sometimes I only managed to continue out of sheer stubbornness. But I firmly believe that any woman can breastfeed if she gets the proper support. That providing that support should be important to all of us for public health reasons. That we need to give women in our society permission to just be moms for a full year if we want a physically and emotionally healthier population in the future.
We are rather unique among developed nations in the pressure we place on new moms to return to the normal life they had before giving birth. Having children changes us and we need time to define a new normal. More women, strong enough to resist the marketing that says products are as as good as parents, strong enough to speak out and say we need support and we need time and space to be mothers, will be the agents for this much needed change in our culture. I'm going to be one of them. Will you join me?
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