from the news:

<< Advocates of breastfeeding say breastfed babies are more intelligent and
 healthier than babies fed bottled milk. Scientific studies tend to support
 this, although the differences between breast and bottle-fed babies are
 subtle.
  >>
Ah, I wish it would say that breastfed babies are as intelligent as healthy
as they can be, reach their full potential, have revved-up immune systems
they would not have had on artificial infant milks, etc. There is always a
loss of information power, when it seems as if people are comparing their
baby to someone else's baby ( "my baby is smarter than the neighbor's anyway,
so I didn't need to to nurse, obviously") instead of comparing who , or how ,
a baby compared with who or how they MIGHT have been...Subtle? Maybe
sometimes. Babies and children who are chronically constipated, crying in
pain in the early months, suffer through a stream of ear infections, etc, are
only 'subtly' different because these other things are unfortunately
considered normal. People go to MDs who treat the symptoms if they can, and
no seems to notice that there is a way to have an effect, subtle sometimes or
perhaps sometimes even profound, on the health and well-being of these little
ones and their families. We are too used to settling for the pathological as
normal. Sometimes things seem subtly different because we don't have the eyes
to notice how profoundly different they really are...
Judy LeVan Fram, Brooklyn

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