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From:
Rachel Myr <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 13 Oct 2005 16:31:44 +0200
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In the thread about how babies can be less stable but using less energy and
taking in more calories, we haven't mentioned the bioavailability factor.
It has been shown that breastfed babies actually take in less volume during
the course of their milk-fed lives than do formula fed babies, even if their
growth is as rapid as their formula fed counterparts.  So, not all that
excess volume sticks with the baby, either.  These data are from term babies
in the first 6 months of life as far as I know, but even premies are human,
and we also know that the nutrient content of milk from mothers of premies
is more concentrated at the beginning than for term babies - again, less
volume needed, though of course the nutritional challenge for micropremies
is much more complex than for term babies.

Once the food gets into your body, you have to digest and metabolize it.  It
costs the baby more to process, and excrete the waste from formula than it
does from breastmilk.  Formula has a higher solute load, and carries a
higher obligatory fluid loss.  That is, a baby will pee more in relation to
volume taken, if given formula than if given breastmilk.  Also, the stools
will be larger, because somewhat less of the formula is actually digestible.

It requires more enzyme activity in the gut to utilize the nutrients in
formula, and both making enzymes and using them require energy.  So, part of
the reason a baby needs a higher volume of formula to do the same job as a
little less breastmilk, is that some of what goes in gets burned up in the
process of making use of the rest.

Breastmilk is an incredibly efficient food, since nearly all of it is
usable, and I am willing to bet that if the only nutrients available to a
mother were in her breastfed baby's stools, she'd do fine in the short run
just recycling them too.  Probably at some point we weren't so wasteful with
the nutritional bonanza in our placentas, either, though I won't be testing
these thoughts empirically anytime soon.  But I did really wonder where all
the kitten poop was when my cat had a litter of four under the couch while
we were on vacation 14 years ago.

As to how you can be less stable but expending less energy and taking in
more calories, imagine someone in an ICU, critically ill, in bed and getting
tube fed industrial strength mayonnaise, versus someone out for a jog and
munching on a head of lettuce.  Being stressed is not the same as exercising
- quite the opposite, actually - and being stable is not the same as
resting, either.

Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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