05/15/2022
First of all we want to let all the parents struggling with the artificial milk shortage know we are thinking about you. It is very scary whenever we can't meet or think we might not be able to meet our children's basic survival needs. Our hearts go out to you during this crisis.
What can a parent safely do in this situation? Many of you are turning to Google for the answer. An old out of date recipe for homemade formula is making the rounds. We can not recommend this cow's milk and Karo syrup recipe. It might fill your little one's tummy but is far from nutritionally complete.
A better choice to consider is the recipe at the bottom of this post which is from Nourishing Traditions by Morrell and Enig. The draw backs to this recipe are that it calls for raw milk from pastured cows which is not easy to access and has the potential of contamination. There are multiple ingredients, some of which are costly and not always accessible.
Another idea being thrown around is getting milk from a milk bank. The milk at milk banks is a precious commodity reserved for the most vulnerable infants. The reality is there isn't enough of it to serve even this small slice of our infant population even during the best of times.
Some families are turning to direct mother to mother donation. This is a time honored approach whenever a mother has problems meeting her baby's breastmilk needs. It too is not without risk. It is very important to know the donor's health, medication, and recreational lifestyle. Women are generously opening up their freezer stashes to offer up during this crisis. Contacts are being made friend to friend, siblings and SILs are stepping up. People are reaching out via social media desperate to find donor milk. Where there is desperation there are unscrupulous people who will take advantage. Beware anyone offering to sell human milk. There is no way to know what they are selling or its safety. Period.
And then there is relactation being bandied about as a simple solution by people who know very little or nothing about lactation and how the human body works. Our breasts are not like a water fountain with a tap you can turn on or off anytime. There isn't milk constantly held in our bodies just waiting for a mouth, hand or pump to draw it out. Making milk is a complicated hormonal process that takes time. Our bodies had 9 months to get ready and then 2 weeks post birth of furious hormonal and physical activity to build our milk making factory and build up our supply. When we stop sending signals to the factory to make milk the factory doesn't just go dormant. It actually tears down some of the milk making infrastructure.
So is relactation possible? Yes but it takes time. Time most parents don't have in this situation. It also may take professional guidance around schedules, herbs and medications. Plus the barriers that stood in the lactating parent's way that caused them to turn to formula in the first place haven't magically vanished. Ni**le pain, return to work, health issues requiring medications not compatible with breastfeeding, unsupportive employers or family, exhaustion, economic realities, and low supply will continue to stand in the way of creating enough milk and feeding it to babies. To those considering the relactation process we encourage you to read this link and seek out a lactation consultant to guide your process and your expectations.
It is weighing heavily on our hearts that there are no good solutions for many of you out there. It is important to consider the phrase "too big to fail" in this context. If one formula maker's problems at one factory can impact so many vulnerable lives we have a systemic problem when it comes to feeding our littles. Frankly, they are too important to fail in this way.
Formula ingredients for homemade raw milk-based formula:
(step by step recipe on page 602 of “Nourishing Traditions”)
*Makes 36 ounces
2 cups of whole fat raw milk, from Pasture-fed cows
¼ cup of home made liquid whey
4 tablespoons of Lactose
¼ teaspoon Bifidobacterium infantis
2 tablespoons of good quality cream (can be pasteurized but NOT ultra pasteurized, or UHT)
½ teaspoon of high vitamin cod liver oil (or 1 teaspoon of regular cod liver oil)
¼ teaspoon of high vitamin butter oil (optional)
1 teaspoon of unrefined sunflower oil
1 teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons of coconut oil
2 teaspoons of Frontier brand nutritional yeast flakes
2 teaspoons of gelatin
1 7/8 cups of filtered water
¼ teaspoon of acerola powder
La Leche League USA helps parents, families, and communities to breastfeed, chestfeed, and human milk feed their babies through parent-to-parent support. LLL USA encourages, informs, educates, supports, and promotes the use of human milk and the intimate relationship and development that comes from....
