Hiy'all,

I've been taking a hiatus from so much wisdom; too much of a good thing!

But duty calls me back.  I've been asked this question that I've 
always wondered about myself, so I'm not much help at answering it. 
Can someone please expound a little on the colostrum issue when 
nursing an older child?  Will the newborn be deprived?  There is so 
little of it and it is all so precious, how does it come about that 
there is enough for both?  And if there isn't, of course, what's to 
be done? (apart from urging newborn to nurse first -- i/e/, should 
older child be discouraged from nursing or nursing "too much" a 
couple days postpartum?)

Is it true that milk "comes in" as a rough function of, say, 
colostrum volume produced?  So that if, say, an older child nurses 
the colostrum then one would expect a) that there be less of it (for 
the newborn) in volume overall and b) that the full milk will appear 
sooner than if the older child hadn't been nursing?  Or is it 
strictly a time postpartum factor?

And I've also always wondered about the constituency of milk.  I 
understand that the relative quantities of various nutrients shifts 
with time so that a toddler will be taking in a slightly different 
fluid from a newborn.  After birth then and when tandem nursing, will 
not that older child be suddenly getting "newborn milk"?  Is this 
problematic?  Certainly it would seem better that the newborn not be 
getting "toddler milk", but what is missing for the older child?

Thanks as always...
-- 
	-Sara ([log in to unmask]).  [LLLL in LA, USA].

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