I will apologize in advance for what is sure to be the length of
this post!  The recent threads on frequency of feeds and other reading I
have been doing have led to some questions.
     Okay.  When talking to a new or about-to-be mother, we let her know
that her baby will need to eat about 8-12 times/24 hours, and that
babies have their own personalities/eating styles, with the time between
feedings varying widely and she should be familiar with hunger cues etc.
In my experience, the "average" newborn babies exhibit their first
hunger cues within 1 to 2 hours of the last nursing, slowly rousing from
sleep and progressing from head turning to sucking motions to
finger/hand sucking to "soft sounds" and so forth, up to the
unmistakable "FEED ME NOW" cry if all other attempts have failed to
elicit the desired affect. This varies, with some babies who request
nursing every 30 mintues and others who will be quite happy and healthy
to wait 2 1/2 hours. Now, if the human infant and the mother's body are
in fact "designed" for ad lib nursing along the lines of several times
an hour, what do you all suppose is the reason the "average" newborn in
our culture does not do so?  Is it proximity to mother/the breast?  Is
our culture's practice, even among mothers who nurse 'on demand" and
don't wait for a cry, of laying the baby down between most nursings(in a
seat, a blanket, a swing, or in Dad's arms)to account for this? Do
babies in "constant contact" cultures exhibit other, even more subtle,
hunger cues? Does the expectation seem to lead to the behavior? I am not
sure I am expressing my questions well, but I find this all very
intriguing.
    The discussions of milk intake have been interesting as well. If it
is true, as seems to be indicated by some research, that milk intake is
static for the first months, it does seem logical that "growth spurts"
and an increase in nursings would be the baby's way of priming the
prolactin levels and increasing fat/caloric intake, even if the overall
amount consumed remains constant. (Would babies who nurse several times
an hour actually consume *less* milk volume than babies who nurse at
greater intervals?  I like Dr. Dettwyler's analogy of skim vs. whole
milk.) It's easy, and seems to make sense to parents, to instruct about
supply/demand of lactation to prepare for "frequency days", but if that
is not what is really going on, has anyone out there changed this part
of parent education? If so, how has this seemed to work?  Just curious.
   Thanks in advance for muddling through this and I look forward to
hearing anybody's comments/answers.

Andrea Simmons
LLL Leader, St. Louis MO