I agree with Linda Smith's wise post. We don't have great data on what is normal, and it doubtless does stem from the fact that our births are so often abnormal. All the meds and interventions may be common, but normal they are not. It is so rare any more to see an unmedicated baby or a mother who comes out of her birth exper. feeling empowered by that encounter with the primal forces. William James wrote about the need for a "moral equivalent of war" ie a cause or experience so dramatic and compelling that it takes one out of one's day to day existence into a heightened state. I always think of childbirth as that kind of opportunity women have for self-discovery. While I don't mean people should engage in martyr trips, many of the angry and depressed women I see look like victims and survivors rather than women warriors. But I digress... Linda wanted to know if any one has data on what outputs look like where births are not managed as ours are. I have to hunt up the ref. when I go into the office, but I saw an article sev. yrs ago from Africa. It didn't address # of diapers specifically, but it did look at infant weight loss post-partum. 3% was about the average. I remember thinking about it at the time and connecting that info to the home-birthed babies and LLL babies I've seen who lost little or nothing pp and immed began to gain well. (Of course, here insert standard caveats that even in these pops. babies or moms can be ill or have problems...) I think our current acceptance as up to 10% loss of body weight pp will one day be looked at as the same kind of ritual starvation of infants practiced by those who wean ill babies to pedialyte. I second Linda about looking at nipple shape when baby comes off the breast and assessing babies individually. But I think we need to remember how stressed most of these techno-birth couples are, and watch babies carefully for adequacy of intake and output. I'll hunt up the ref. referred to above and post to the list. Barbara Wilson-Clay, BSE, IBCLC priv. pract. Austin, Tx