Hi to all my Lactnut friends - I miss y'all!  I dare not go off NOMAIL until
my semester is over but I did hear about this thread and couldn't resist
chiming in.  My knowledge base here is entirely personal, not professional,
and my own experience with MS does not encompass any of my own pregnancies
or postpartum.  But just as I read everything I could about breastfeeding
when I wanted to be a well-prepared mom, so too have I read everything I can
about MS now that I need to be well-informed for my current and future
health as a person with MS.  So I feel pretty confident that what I am
saying here is accurate.

The claim that breastfeeding would cause MS to worsen is incorrect.  What
*does* happen is that new moms with MS often have a lot of MS relapses in
the early postpartum period, after enjoying a relatively symptom-free
pregnancy.  Stress-induced problems in postpartum, due to lack of sleep, all
the new parent stuff, etc. are one possibility;  some people with MS feel
that exhaustion can make them more susceptible to a relapse.  Another theory
(and this makes lots of sense) is that the natural protective
immunosuppressive effects of pregnancy (those subtle changes in the mom's
immune system that enable her to be pregnant) may be beneficial in MS, an
autoimmune disease.  Once the baby's born, those protective
immunosuppressive effects are gone, and when her immune system "shifts
gears," she may have some tough times with MS relapses.

The only correlation with breastfeeding is that it also occurs after the
baby is born ;-D

Moms with MS are like anyone else - their own experiences vary greatly from
the experiences of others in similar situations.  MS is a tremendously
unpredictable disease and so anecdotal evidence for particular lifestyle
changes, dietary modifications, medication regimens, etc. should be
interpreted with great caution.

Mary Renard, RN, BSN, IBCLC

(who's gearing up for final exams in o-chem, physics and microbiology -
let's hope that exhaustion theory is incorrect! :D )

Vienna Virginia  USA