bare minimum bfing duration

[ted]

little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..

Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
get breast milk? I told 6 months.

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

Thanks.

[Lucy]

"ted" > wrote in message
om...
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?

I don't think it's really quantifiable. I mean, some babies are never
breastfed and do OK, so it could be argued that the bare minimum is no time
at all! It all depends on what you consider acceptable.

Personally, I suppose a bare minimum for me would be to nurse until she can
thrive on a balanced diet of 'real' food, since I never want my baby to have
formula. That's just me though, and even that is not a specific time limit,
since it depends on my baby's readiness.

Considering the problems your friend has been having, it probably wouldn't
be wise to tell her she has to nurse for x number of months. It might be
best if she just concentrate on getting the baby to the breast and take it
one day at a time.

Just my opinion.

Lucy

[Iuil]

"ted" wrote
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?

LLL have a saying: 1 year is better than 1 month, 1 month is better than 1
week, 1 week is better than 1 day, 1 day is better than 1 hour.

IOW, each additional feed adds to the previous ones but even 1feed is better
than none.

Jean - who took it one *minute* at a time at one stage

--
HOLLY: Nothing wrong with dog's milk. Full of goodness, full of
vitamins, full of marrowbone jelly. Lasts longer than any other type
of milk, dog's milk.
LISTER: Why?
HOLLY: No bugger'll drink it. Plus the advantage of dog's milk is when
it goes off it takes exactly the same as when it's fresh.
LISTER: Why didn't you tell me, Holly?!
HOLLY: What, and spoil your tea?
(Red Dwarf: Series 2, Episode 1)

[Emily Roysdon]

ted wrote:
<snip>

> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?
>

I think of one year as the barest bare minimum. I get sad when I hear
about children under the age of two being weaned. But then, I'm a
zealot :-)


Emily

[Phoebe & Allyson]

ted wrote:

> But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?

As long as she can. There's no magic cutoff date.

Phoebe :)
--
yahoo address is unread - substitute mailbolt

[UberMinx]

"Emily Roysdon" > wrote in message
om...
> ted wrote:
> <snip>
>
> > What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> > until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> > can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> > time?

<delurk>

When I had my first child I had terrible problems getting him to latch,
partially because I didn't have much for him to latch on to, I had also had
a c-section which meant finding a decent position was much harder and
partially because the midwives kept sneaking him out in the night and giving
him a bottle, but then berating me when he wouldn't latch properly. This
was 10 years ago, and UK midwifery policies have changed a bit since then.

At the time also, it was recommended to breast feed for 3-4 months if
possible, rather than the recommended 6 months now.

I ended up struggling on through the colostrum stage (expressing mostly) and
then moving on to formula after that. In retrospect, I think I would have
struggled to keep him fed and happy after 3-4 months on mere milk, he was
taking 8x 8oz bottles a day by then.

I'm certainly going to try again this time around to b-f, but I think the
most important thing is to not have any expectations about what will happen
in the future.
I will give it my best shot, and if it works out then great. You can't
predict how things are going to turn out, and to my mind, you have to just
go with what's best for the baby while you can. Trying to put a timescale on
it adds un-necessary anxiety which if it doesn't go according to plan can
make the mother berate herself for "failing" and can add extra pressure to a
time when pressure is the last thing you really need. Feeding the baby
should be enjoyable, and no-one should feel guilty or unhappy if things
don't go the way they hope.

JMO

UberMinx

<relurk>

[Dan Kegel]

ted wrote:
> Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> get breast milk? I told 6 months.
>
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1974976.stm suggests that
breastfeeding up to 7 months increases IQ with each additional
month, but that breastfeeding beyond 7 months does not confer
additional benefit.

This agrees quite well with your six month estimate.
- Dan

[Jenrose]

> Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> get breast milk? I told 6 months.
>
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?
>

My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would allow a
baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk, period,
so they really must nurse.)

But really there is no set minimum. I think 6 months is a wise "bottom", but
I couldn't imagine weaning my daughter at age 6 months.

I think the ideal is to give breastmilk until the baby is old enough for
something other than formula. That usually means age 1. But is it reasonable
to expect a mother who pumps exclusively to pump for a full year? I don't
know. Obviously some babies never get breast milk. Others nurse for 6
years+. But as for biological minimums? I think age 1 is sort of the bottom
limit I'd accept for a baby without a tendancy to allergy and 2 years is the
absolute earliest I'd think about considering a child "self weaning" vs.
"nursing strike" in my family because we *all* get allergies.

Jenrose

[Jenrose]

"UberMinx" > wrote in message
...
>
> "Emily Roysdon" > wrote in message
> om...
> > ted wrote:
> > <snip>
> >
> > > What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> > > until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> > > can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> > > time?
>
> <delurk>
>

> I ended up struggling on through the colostrum stage (expressing mostly)
and
> then moving on to formula after that. In retrospect, I think I would have
> struggled to keep him fed and happy after 3-4 months on mere milk, he was
> taking 8x 8oz bottles a day by then.
>

Given that my daughter was able to triple her birthweight in just over 4
months (She was not quite 8 pounds when born, was 20 pounds at her 4 month
check), you might be surprised. With a bad latch, it can be difficult to get
anything out. With a good latch, it's very difficult NOT to meet the needs
of even a "huge" baby. Or twins. It is rare, when a latch is good and a baby
nurses well and frequently, for a mother to not simply be able to produce
however much milk her kiddo needs.

If you were already expressing in the colostrum phase, I'm guessing that
nipple confusion added to whatever initial difficulties there were. What
kind of nipples do you have? (I know, odd personal question, but my breasts
are very large and my nipples very small, and if you've got the same, I can
probably tell you some ways of figuring how to make it work better next
time.)

FWIW--nursing was torture for me the first week. Then someone helped me fix
my latch (and my nipple shape turned out to be completely irrelevant to what
was making the latch bad) and poof, it worked and didn't hurt.

Jenrose

[Shannon G]

"Jenrose" > wrote in message
s.com...
>
> My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would allow
a
> baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk,
period,
> so they really must nurse.)
>

I'm certainly not disputing your minimum of two years. I am, however,
disputing your claim that a child *must* nurse simply because they are not
drinking cows milk. You can get Vitamin D from sunlight and calcium from
cheese, yogurt, etc. and what happened to good old fashioned water for
hydration? Milk should certainly not be compared as a substitution for
breastmilk, nor should it be construed as a staple food for humans.

Shannon

[Irrational Number]

ted wrote:
> little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
> section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
> are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
> of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
> with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..

You know, the baby is still young enough to learn.
Pillbug was in the NICU for 5 days where he got
bottles a-plenty! Also, I'd hobble over, nurse
him, then they'd give in 3 oz. of formula because
he was still hungry.

I didn't have a problem with that. When we got
home and he still needed formula because he was
always hungry, the pediatrician told us at the
1-week WBV that we can ditch the formula if we
really wanted to BF, so we did. Within a few
days, everything was fine. (Everything meaning
we were on our way. There were a LOT of bumps!)

-- Anita --
--
SUCCESS FOUR FLIGHTS THURSDAY MORNING ALL AGAINST
TWENTY ONE MILE WIND STARTED FROM LEVEL WITH ENGINE
POWER ALONE AVERAGE SPEED THROUGH AIR THIRTY ONE
MILES LONGEST 57 SECONDS INFORM PRESS HOME CHRISTMAS.

[KC]

With my first dd I did the exclusive pumping thing, but I never more
than half fed her. Anyway, I kept doing it until she was 5.5 months
old. 6 months had been my goal, but I had to go to training for a week
for my job, and it was quite grueling, so that hastened our weaning.

Anyway, I do think that my baby had more mental leaps before the ebm
was cut out of her diet, and then at 1 year when we switched from
formula to cows milk it seemed like she had more mental leaps again.
it could be coincidence, but I got very suspect of formula after that,
so I would say 1 year is the minimum.

KC -
buy or rent a Whittlestone Breast Expresser at:
http://www.alittlestore.com

(ted) wrote in message >...
> little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
> section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
> are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
> of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
> with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..
>
> Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> get breast milk? I told 6 months.
>
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?
>
> Thanks.

[Irene]

Dan Kegel > wrote in message >...
> ted wrote:
> > Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> > pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> > about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> > long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> > get breast milk? I told 6 months.
> >
> > What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> > until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> > can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> > time?
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1974976.stm suggests that
> breastfeeding up to 7 months increases IQ with each additional
> month, but that breastfeeding beyond 7 months does not confer
> additional benefit.
>
> This agrees quite well with your six month estimate.
> - Dan

But since the benefits of breastfeeding on IQ are still very much
debated, and the other benefits (boost to the immune system, perfectly
balanced nutrition, and of course the emotional benefits) do not end
at 7 months, there is no reason to pick 6 months as an estimate.

However, the OP's friend really just needs to take it one day at a
time.

Irene

[iphigenia]

UberMinx wrote:
>
> I ended up struggling on through the colostrum stage (expressing
> mostly) and then moving on to formula after that. In retrospect, I
> think I would have struggled to keep him fed and happy after 3-4
> months on mere milk, he was taking 8x 8oz bottles a day by then.
>

Your breasts will make as much as they're asked to make. There's no weight
limit on how big a baby your breasts can nourish.

--
iphigenia
www.tristyn.net
"i have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
i do not think that they will sing to me."

[Bruce and Jeanne]

ted wrote:

> little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
> section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
> are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
> of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
> with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..
>
> Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> get breast milk? I told 6 months.
>
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?
>

This minimum has changed over time. When my sister gave birth to her
daughter (14 years ago), she was told it was essential for baby to get
the colostrum and that was basically it. Then it was 3 months. A few
years later, 6 months. And now you hear one year which I think is a bit
unrealistic. The one year minimum just sets up a lot of women to feel
like failures.

I would agree 6 months would be a great minimum goal.

Jeanne (who started by setting her minimum at 3 months and then went on
for 3 years)

[UberMinx]

"Jenrose" > wrote in message
s.com...

> Given that my daughter was able to triple her birthweight in just over 4
> months (She was not quite 8 pounds when born, was 20 pounds at her 4 month
> check), you might be surprised. With a bad latch, it can be difficult to
get
> anything out. With a good latch, it's very difficult NOT to meet the needs
> of even a "huge" baby. Or twins. It is rare, when a latch is good and a
baby
> nurses well and frequently, for a mother to not simply be able to produce
> however much milk her kiddo needs.
>
> If you were already expressing in the colostrum phase, I'm guessing that
> nipple confusion added to whatever initial difficulties there were. What
> kind of nipples do you have? (I know, odd personal question, but my
breasts
> are very large and my nipples very small, and if you've got the same, I
can
> probably tell you some ways of figuring how to make it work better next
> time.)
>
> FWIW--nursing was torture for me the first week. Then someone helped me
fix
> my latch (and my nipple shape turned out to be completely irrelevant to
what
> was making the latch bad) and poof, it worked and didn't hurt.
>
> Jenrose
>
>

Hi, thanks for replying to me.

When I had DS, my nipples weren't quite "inverted" but they were completely
flat. This time around I have been using the Nipplette system to try and
draw them out a bit, and they have come out a bit more, so I am hoping that
will help somewhat. I am quite heavily breasted, and am having an elective
C-section this time around (emergency one last time) so positioning will
depend on what is most comfortable to maintain over a long period of time.
Someone suggested holding the baby in a kind of "rugby ball" hold, i.e.
holding the baby with the opposite arm to the breast I am feeding with,
across the stomach, but I would love to hear what suggestions you have. I am
very determined to do the best I can this time to make it a success, so the
more info I am armed with the better.

However, I don't want to disrupt the OP from their thread, so if you would
like to email me, please just remove the spam block from my email address.

Gill

[KC]

I just wanted to say I used the nipplette too. With my first dd my
nipples were flat, and nursing always hurt, so when I was pg this time
I stumbled upon the nipplette. I was in my third trimester, and they
said not to use it then, but i did anyway :-) because I was so excited
to have something that would fix the flat nipples. My nipples did
stretch out with it, and boy they totally come out when my dd sucks on
them. It was nothing like that with my first, so I know those
nipplettes worked great.

KC -
buy or rent Whittlestone Breast Expressers at:
http://www.alittlestore.com



"UberMinx" > wrote in message >...

> Hi, thanks for replying to me.
>
> When I had DS, my nipples weren't quite "inverted" but they were completely
> flat. This time around I have been using the Nipplette system to try and
> draw them out a bit, and they have come out a bit more, so I am hoping that
> will help somewhat. I am quite heavily breasted, and am having an elective
> C-section this time around (emergency one last time) so positioning will
> depend on what is most comfortable to maintain over a long period of time.
> Someone suggested holding the baby in a kind of "rugby ball" hold, i.e.
> holding the baby with the opposite arm to the breast I am feeding with,
> across the stomach, but I would love to hear what suggestions you have. I am
> very determined to do the best I can this time to make it a success, so the
> more info I am armed with the better.
>
> However, I don't want to disrupt the OP from their thread, so if you would
> like to email me, please just remove the spam block from my email address.
>
> Gill

[Jenrose]

"UberMinx" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> >
>
> Hi, thanks for replying to me.
>
> When I had DS, my nipples weren't quite "inverted" but they were
completely
> flat. This time around I have been using the Nipplette system to try and
> draw them out a bit, and they have come out a bit more, so I am hoping
that
> will help somewhat. I am quite heavily breasted, and am having an elective
> C-section this time around (emergency one last time) so positioning will
> depend on what is most comfortable to maintain over a long period of time.
> Someone suggested holding the baby in a kind of "rugby ball" hold, i.e.
> holding the baby with the opposite arm to the breast I am feeding with,
> across the stomach, but I would love to hear what suggestions you have. I
am
> very determined to do the best I can this time to make it a success, so
the
> more info I am armed with the better.
>

I think if you *can* nurse side lying, that can be the most comfortable.
Otherwise I'd say go for the football hold.

Another thing which helped me (I have heavy, heavy breasts and tiny nipples)
was to support my breast with an "L" shape rather than a "C" shape. That is,
rather than simply cup my breast, I made an "L" (To do this, point your
thumb at the ceiling and hold your hand straight so there's a 90 degree
angle between your thumb and your fingers) and made sure that my fingers
were parallel to my daughter's mouth. This helped point the nipple into her
mouth rather than up at the roof of her mouth.


> However, I don't want to disrupt the OP from their thread, so if you would
> like to email me, please just remove the spam block from my email address.

Eh, don't worry about it! This is what this group is for.

Jenrose

[Jenrose]

"Shannon G" > wrote in message
...
>
> "Jenrose" > wrote in message
> s.com...
> >
> > My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would
allow
> a
> > baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk,
> period,
> > so they really must nurse.)
> >
>
> I'm certainly not disputing your minimum of two years. I am, however,
> disputing your claim that a child *must* nurse simply because they are not
> drinking cows milk. You can get Vitamin D from sunlight and calcium from
> cheese, yogurt, etc. and what happened to good old fashioned water for
> hydration? Milk should certainly not be compared as a substitution for
> breastmilk, nor should it be construed as a staple food for humans.

My daughter was allergic to soy AND dairy. Not just milk, but cheese,
butter, yogurt, ghee, whey, casien. Also eggs. She is not lactose intolerant
(although she might be, since she really can't try out a glass of milk to
find out, we'll never know). She is in fact, milk allergic. Give her milk or
ANY dairy, poof, symptoms. Give her antihistimine, the symptoms get better.

Trust me, she needed my milk. She nursed more like a typical 8-month old in
terms of quantity through age 2 1/2. At that point she was taking in enough
rice milk, meat, etc. that she was able to cut back her volume of nursing.

I find it interesting that *all* of the "alternative" foods you recommended
are dairy.

Jenrose

[Dawn Lawson]

Jenrose wrote:


> I find it interesting that *all* of the "alternative" foods you recommended
> are dairy.

Off the top of my head:
broccoli
almonds

[Jenrose]

"Dawn Lawson" > wrote in message
news:MfXhb.70695$6C4.29734@pd7tw1no...
>
>
> Jenrose wrote:
>
>
> > I find it interesting that *all* of the "alternative" foods you
recommended
> > are dairy.
>
> Off the top of my head:
> broccoli
> almonds
>

There's almost no way to feed a child sufficient broccoli and almonds
(especially an allergic child avoiding nuts at age 2) to provide sufficient
dairy on a daily basis. Nursing is easier.

Jenrose

[Shannon G]

"Jenrose" > wrote in message
s.com...
>
> "Shannon G" > wrote in message
> ...
> >
> > "Jenrose" > wrote in message
> > s.com...
> > >
> > > My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would
> allow
> > a
> > > baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk,
> > period,
> > > so they really must nurse.)
> > >
> >
> > I'm certainly not disputing your minimum of two years. I am, however,
> > disputing your claim that a child *must* nurse simply because they are
not
> > drinking cows milk. You can get Vitamin D from sunlight and calcium
from
> > cheese, yogurt, etc. and what happened to good old fashioned water for
> > hydration? Milk should certainly not be compared as a substitution for
> > breastmilk, nor should it be construed as a staple food for humans.
>
> My daughter was allergic to soy AND dairy. Not just milk, but cheese,
> butter, yogurt, ghee, whey, casien. Also eggs. She is not lactose
intolerant
> (although she might be, since she really can't try out a glass of milk to
> find out, we'll never know). She is in fact, milk allergic. Give her milk
or
> ANY dairy, poof, symptoms. Give her antihistimine, the symptoms get
better.
>
> Trust me, she needed my milk. She nursed more like a typical 8-month old
in
> terms of quantity through age 2 1/2. At that point she was taking in
enough
> rice milk, meat, etc. that she was able to cut back her volume of nursing.
>
> I find it interesting that *all* of the "alternative" foods you
recommended
> are dairy.
>

*All* the ones I mentioned? There were two... cheese & yogurt. I also
said, etc. which I should've skipped and mentioned beans, ie. navy, kidney,
salmon sardines, okra, carrots, oranges, broccoli......etc." I state again
my claim that cows milk is certainly not human staple food and breastmilk is
not a substitution for cows milk. That was the point I was originally
trying to make.

Shannon

[Judy King]

"ted" > wrote in message
om...
> little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
> section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
> are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
> of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
> with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..
>
> Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
> pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
> about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
> long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
> get breast milk? I told 6 months.
>
> What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
> until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
> can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
> time?
>
> Thanks.

I have to agree with the majority. As long as she can. I also think it's
important to keep your goals small and then reassess. I found the goal of a
year insurmountable with DS but when I made my goal six weeks I actually got
to three months. Not ideal but better than six weeks you will agree.

Look at it this way as long as the benefits overall outweight the problems
the keep it up.

Sorry no simple answer I'm afraid.

Judy

[Elaine]

In article >, Jenrose wrote:
> There's almost no way to feed a child sufficient broccoli and almonds
> (especially an allergic child avoiding nuts at age 2) to provide sufficient
> dairy on a daily basis. Nursing is easier.

Hrm, how much calcium does an infant/toddler need anyway? My
husband and I are dairy and soy intolerant so there won't be
any cheese, etc. in our house. To be honest, calcium was
pretty far down my list of nutrients to worry about, so
I hadn't gotten that far yet.

Elaine

[Nikki]

"Jenrose"

> There's almost no way to feed a child sufficient broccoli and almonds
> (especially an allergic child avoiding nuts at age 2) to provide sufficient
> dairy on a daily basis. Nursing is easier.

I was interested so I looked it up on the AAP website. According to
them a toddler 1yr-3yrs old should have 500 mg of calcium a day. For
a reference point one cup of milk has 300mg of calcium. I didn't
include other dairy products below since we are looking for non-dairy
sources.

1/2 cup cooked broccoli or 1 cup raw has 35mg
1 cup of calcium fortified OJ has 300mg
1/2 cup cooked spinach or 1-1.5 cups raw has 120mg but there was a
note saying that calcium from spinach is essentially nonbioavailable
20 sardines with bones has 50mg
1/2 cup mashed sweet potatoe has 44mg.

So, lets see... I'd hard sell OJ :-)

--

Nikki
Mama to Hunter and Luke

[Dawn Lawson]

Nikki wrote:
> "Jenrose"
>
>
>>There's almost no way to feed a child sufficient broccoli and almonds
>>(especially an allergic child avoiding nuts at age 2) to provide sufficient
>>dairy on a daily basis. Nursing is easier.
>
>
> I was interested so I looked it up on the AAP website. According to
> them a toddler 1yr-3yrs old should have 500 mg of calcium a day. For
> a reference point one cup of milk has 300mg of calcium. I didn't
> include other dairy products below since we are looking for non-dairy
> sources.
>
> 1/2 cup cooked broccoli or 1 cup raw has 35mg
> 1 cup of calcium fortified OJ has 300mg
> 1/2 cup cooked spinach or 1-1.5 cups raw has 120mg but there was a
> note saying that calcium from spinach is essentially nonbioavailable
> 20 sardines with bones has 50mg
> 1/2 cup mashed sweet potatoe has 44mg.
>
> So, lets see... I'd hard sell OJ :-)

If you HAD to supplement, why not add a calcium supplement powder to
food? There are various forms of calcium which are variable in their
bioavailablity, but also a lot of supplements...even those chewy
chocolate ones made for women could be a consideration.


Dawn

[Elaine]

In article >, Nikki wrote:
> I was interested so I looked it up on the AAP website. According to
> them a toddler 1yr-3yrs old should have 500 mg of calcium a day. For
> a reference point one cup of milk has 300mg of calcium. I didn't
> include other dairy products below since we are looking for non-dairy
> sources.
>
> 1/2 cup cooked broccoli or 1 cup raw has 35mg
> 1 cup of calcium fortified OJ has 300mg
> 1/2 cup cooked spinach or 1-1.5 cups raw has 120mg but there was a
> note saying that calcium from spinach is essentially nonbioavailable
> 20 sardines with bones has 50mg
> 1/2 cup mashed sweet potatoe has 44mg.
>
> So, lets see... I'd hard sell OJ :-)

Actually - you can get the same powder that's added to
OJ to calcium fortify it and sprinkle it on foods. That's
a lot of OJ to get down every day, besides being pretty
acidic. Calcium fortified OJ is my primary source for
calcium, and it's getting pretty old. :)

Elaine

[Taniwha grrrl]

Elaine wrote:

To be honest, calcium was
> pretty far down my list of nutrients to worry about, so
> I hadn't gotten that far yet.
>

I've been doing a little reading on calcium as I am a bit
concerned with getting osteoporosis (Brittle Bones) and was
surprised to find your bones only store calcium until your
late teens, so the diet needs to be rich in it before then.
After that age the bones no longer store calcium and the
blood removes what calcium it needs for function out of the
bones to compensate for dietary inadequacies after that
(well and before that too, but the key thing is the bones
stop hoarding it). The more calcium the blood has to take
the more porus your bones become and the more at risk you
are of Osteoperosis.....from what I understand, there's
probably a lot more to it than just that though. The bones
retain calcium better too when you do weight baring
exercises (resistance work), the more you exercise and tone
the muscles around the bone the better the bone retains it's
calcium. Also you loose more when there is not enough
oestrogen in your system, which is why womyn going through
menopause are at high risk.
It just made me aware that it's important to get lots of
calcium into my kids, especially teenagers now bfore it's
too late like it is for me.


--
Andrea

If I can't be a good example, then I'll just have to be a
horrible warning.

[H Schinske]

Andrea wrote:

>The bones
>retain calcium better too when you do weight baring
>exercises (resistance work), the more you exercise and tone
>the muscles around the bone the better the bone retains its
>calcium.

To cheer you up a little, may I mention that pregnancy counts as a weight
bearing exercise :-) Really, it does.

--Helen

[H Schinske]

wrote:

>There's almost no way to feed a child sufficient broccoli and almonds
>(especially an allergic child avoiding nuts at age 2) to provide sufficient
>dairy on a daily basis. Nursing is easier.

I take it you meant "calcium," not "dairy" in the above. Breastmilk isn't
actually all that rich in calcium. On the other hand, the calcium requirement
for toddlers is still being debated. See
http://www.kellymom.com/nutrition/calcium.html#comparison

Human milk contains less calcium than cow's milk, but the calcium in human milk
has over twice the bioavailability of the calcium in cow's milk. According to
the American Academy of Pediatrics Policy Statement on Calcium Requirements of
Infants, Children, and Adolescents:

No available evidence shows that exceeding the amount of calcium retained by
the exclusively breastfed term infant during the first 6 months of life or the
amount retained by the human milk-fed infant supplemented with solid foods
during the second 6 months of life is beneficial to achieving long-term
increases in bone mineralization... Few data are available about the calcium
requirements of children before puberty. Calcium retention is relatively low in
toddlers and slowly increases as puberty approaches.

Human milk averages 200-340 mg/liter [Hamosh 1991, Riordan & Auerbach 1999], or
5.9-10.1 mg/oz calcium. 67% of this calcium is absorbed by the body [Riordan &
Auerbach 1999].

Infant formulas contain 15.6 mg/oz calcium; toddler formulas contain 24-27
mg/oz calcium. Extra calcium is added to infant formulas because of the lower
bioavailability of the calcium from formulas as compared to human milk (they
aim for baby to absorb the same amount of calcium as would be absorbed from
breastmilk).

Whole milk contains 291 mg/8 oz [Nutrient Content of Select Dairy Foods from
the National Dairy Council], or 36.4 mg/oz calcium. 25-30% of cow's milk is
absorbed by the body [Calcium Counseling Resources: Absorption / Utilization
Issues from the National Dairy Council].
------------------
So it seems that breastmilk has about one-quarter the calcium of cow's milk by
volume, but the greater bioavailability raises it to perhaps half the calcium
of cow's milk.

--Helen