Does anyone out there know when the pharmaceuticals began marketing
infant formula?
I remember my parents making home made formula from evaporated milk and
dextrose, sterilizing the bottles in that huge bottle sterilizer back in
1958 when my brother was born. When my sister was born in 1963, we had to
mix up Nutramigen for her bec. she didn't tolerate whatever else there
was.
So, when did Similac etc. come on the scene?
I also remember my mother pumping her milk in 1958 when she came home
from the hospital, she used the original "bicycle horn" pump that didn't
have a storage bottle attached! Those suckers were strictly for relieving
engorgement and the milk was dumped! No one would have thought of her
actually BREASTFEEDING. This was in Cleveland Ohio. I was born there 9
years earlier and also wasn't breastfed. My brother born in 1948 in
Munich was breastfed for 8 months....
Why did I choose to breastfeed? Me, the girl who asked her sister who was
breastfeeding if she felt like a cow!!!Yes, I actually said that!! But I
saw that sister's mothering style was so much better than those others
who did NOT breastfeed. I also feel that breastfeeding is an entire
mothering style, not simply a feeding method.
When I teach WIC prenatal classes, I don't teach formula feeding, I tell
the moms I know nothing about it, they can speak to the nutritionists
about it individually. On Thanksgiving I happened to catch a PBS program
about polar bear cubs that had been abandoned by their mother, and
adopted by the Denver zoo. The zookkeepers spent lots of time with these
twins, and they had a terrible time coming up with a suitable "formula".
I used that as an analogy, each mammal's specific milk, etc. But my
favorite part of the analogy is talking about how the mother bear goes
into the cave to give birth and cuddles with the baby til spring when
its time to come out! We need to adopt the "cave mentality!" I tell them
that if they aren't going to breastfeed, they still need to hold their
babies when they bottlefeed....
Pearl Shifer, IBCLC
P.S. Speaking of Cleveland, does anyone know if children born there in
1949 were immunized against pertussis?