I was asked to post this from another list:
----- Original Message -----
From: Linda Palmer
To: Undisclosed-Recipient:;
Sent: Tuesday, September 07, 2004 1:22 PM
Subject: [SanDiegoNaturalFamilies] HELP AP/VEGAN BABY TAKEN FROM FAMILY --
PLEASE CIRUCULATE
PLEASE CIRCULATE
Healthy breastfed 14m.o. removed from parents' care for vegan lifestyle:
I have known this man through internet and telephone contacts for years
(going through parenting and nutrition research papers with him -- he's
very research oriented) who now has had his child taken away because the
doctors were very freaked out that a 14m.o. recieves human milk still
(instead of cow's milk as they recommend), is parented by attachment
parenting methods and is fed raw vegetables, nuts, yeast and such with no
meat or eggs. They brought him in for a fever and the doctors found slight
anemia (which is known in medical literature to be common in an ill child)
and has no other test studies to support a diagnosis of "failure to thrive"
(the baby is in the lower 25percentile for weight and has reached all his
developmental milestones and according to the grandmother in the newspaper
story was "always happy" before being removed from his parents' care). The
family is in New York and needs good legal counsel (i.e. understands
breastfeeding and nutrition and natural parenting practices) in that state,
for starters. I was asked to circulate the below. Regards, Linda Folden
Palmer, DC, author Baby Matters, infant nutrition consultant
-----------------------
ATTENTION ALL VEGANS and VEGETARIANS --
Would you want your child taken from you because you refused to feed
him/her meat, dairy or other animal products? As a mother, would you feel
comfortable knowing that your nursing child had been taken from you and
placed in a foster home where he/she would be fed commercial baby food and
milk-based baby formula? That his/her social and emotional needs were
being ignored, even though you and your spouse adhered to tenets of
Attachment Parenting and the Continuum Concept (both proven to optimize
child development)?
There's a witch hunt in our midst:
http://www.nydailynews.com/09-07-2004/news/crime_file/story/229622p-
197218c.html
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09062004/news/regionalnews/29978.htm
WHAT CAN YOU DO TO HELP?
If you are a lawyer, a medical professional, a holistic practitioner, or a
parenting expert, please respond ASAP. This family needs advocates from
the vegan and vegetarian communities DESPERATELY, before their family is
torn apart again.
If you are a nursing vegan or vegetarian mother, or a practicing
vegan/vegetarian (parent or not), GET THE WORD OUT! Feel free to cross-
post this message to other vegan/vegetarian groups, tell your friends about
this injustice, spread the word.
Write to the Editors of the Daily News and the New York Post. Tell them
that this sort of slanted journalism is unacceptable.
[log in to unmask] and [log in to unmask]
WHY DO I CARE?
This concerns my godson's future, his parents' rights, and the rights of
all vegan/vegetarian parents to raise their children as they choose,
without unwanted interventoin. I was raised vegan and vegetarian, and have
been healthier and freer of childhood illness, infection and disease
because of my mother and father's wise choices. Because New York City's
medical "professionals" are uninformed about the benefits of a
vegan/vegetarian diet, *especially* for children, they have mounted an
attack on my godson's well-being. He was a healthy, happy, breast-fed,
vegan/organic, well-adjusted baby before he was taken from his parents
(after an emergency hospital visit for a high fever) and placed in foster
care. The cause? Iron-deficiency anemia (9.1), which -- as most medical
professionals should know -- is common in all children, even those who eat
meat or dairy. From Medline, "Drinking too much cow's milk is a classic
cause of iron deficiency in young children." (Full article, click here:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/007134.htm#Definition)
Thank you for your time, and please help if you can....
-Arien Muzacz
[log in to unmask]
Note from linda palmer: -- Now that's a skinny baby if I ever saw one (??
below). He's in the 25 percentile for breastfed babies and has met all of
his milestones of walking, babbling, coordination... and grandmother said
(in the newspaper article) that the boy was always happy before this
occurred. A malnourished child is not "always happy," i guarantee.
Ellen Penchuk, IBCLC, RLC
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