Awhile back, Jay Gordon wrote:
<<A baby who nurses "perfectly" and goes side to side all through the first 24
hrs of life is probably getting only a few teaspoons of colostrum.
Therefore, a baby nursing not-so-well is being shortchanged very little in
the way of food, fuel and fluid.
There is absolutely NO medical/physiologic problem when a carefully observed
baby does not nurse well in the first day of life, except . . . we have to
help the mom with lots of encouragement and coaching so that things don't
slip during the second 24 hours.>>
Jay, with all due respect, I saved this old post to look up the following
info from Michel Odent's book, "The Nature of Birth and Breastfeeding"
pp71-73:
"First of all, let us look at what makes the colostrum produced in those very
first hours so special. It is a real concentration of antibodies, containing
huge amounts of those substances that protect us against invaders, be they
microbes, viruses, or another person's living cells. The most copious
antibodies, called IgA, cannot be made by the newborn itself and are not
brought via the placenta. They are available in the first hours following
birth in tens of milligrams per milliliter, and they protect the fragile
mucous membranes of the bowels and of the respiratory tract. Their favorite
targets are the microbes and viruses with which we have to cohabit from
birth, since they are satellites of our mother.
In the colostrum of the first hours there are also millions of
immune-active cells per cubic millimeter; the following week they can be
counted only in the thousands. These macrophages and other kinds of white
cells can neutralize and digest the most dangerous of germs. Colostrum is, in
fact, an army able to suppress any kind of infection. It contains up to 10
grams per liter of an ingenious anti-infection weapon called lactoferrin. ...
One has to understand that to be born is to enter the world of microbes.
There are no microbes in the intestine of the fetus before birth; but within
twenty-four hours afterward, there are billions of them per gram. If the baby
has not been feeding, or as been given sugar and water or a "small" bottle of
artificial milk, the microbes in his or her system will be quite different
from those that will be present if he or she has taken only colostrum. The
future of the intestinal flora depends on the first germs that occupy the
territory. If the newborn has only consumed colostrum, the dominant microbes
belong to the bifidobacterium family and are accompanied by some coliform
bacteria to which the baby is already adapted, since they come from the
mother. The newborn needs to be contaminated as early as possible by the
domestic microbes that are satellites of its mother, and in this way be as
well protected as possible in the event of an attack by more dangerous
microbes.
In fact, it is unrealistic to dissociate the study of anti-infection
strategies from the study of factors that reinforce the intestinal mucous
membranes."
According to the research of Jeff Bland, every type of cell found in the
brain is also found in the gut and it is gut health that determines the
health and functioning of the brain and nervous system. We as a species have
a long history of denying colostrum to our young, and it seems likely to me
that even those of us who are the biggest advocates of bf may harbor some of
the underlying beliefs which have allowed this to proliferate. I personally
have come to believe that the beginning and ending of bf are far more
important than we ever realized to human physiological development.
Jennifer Tow, IBCLC, CT, USA
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