Dear all: I have to heartily second Rachel Myr's comments about babies "growing the same". There is a vast amount of research on this topic, most notably by Reynaldo Martorell. Even before the new growth charts, we knew that the amount of genetic variation among infants (including pygmies) in growth from birth to age five is remarkably similar when they are well nourished. The assumption that some populations are genetically short is a false one. Many of these populations have suffered widespread malnutrition. In segments of those populations that are well noursihed or who move to other countries where their nutritional status improves, they grow similarly. There is genetic variation among individuals within their populations so that some infants will grow along the 1st percentile and that is their normal rate of growth just as other individuals will grow along the 99th percentile and that is their normal rate of growth. The reason why I mentioned the narrowing of the growth curves to healthy babies who were not failling to thrive and the potential culturally-based exclusion of infants who might have gained at an even faster rate in a completely ad libitum breastfeeding environment is that many lactation consultants are working as clinicians rather than in public health. So, we may very well see those children who are above or below the 1st or 99th percentile., While we should certainly evaluate why these children are at the extreme ends to rule out any problems and probably will catch some problems, we may be the ones who also detect the exceptions that may actually be healthy and normal despite being off the charts at one end or the other. Perhaps I may have even missed some points that Kathy Dettwyler mentioned when the research was being conducted for the growth charts. I am now thinking about the African style of nursing about 20 times a day. There may well be some infants who would grow at an even faster and healthy rate on the African nursing style plan. My training taught me that it is the growth trajectory that is more important than the particular curve and that plateaus and dips are a warning signal. Best regards, Susan Burger *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html