Dr. Ruth Lawrence's book Breastfeeding: A Guide for
the Medical Profession,
1994, p. 619 states:
" Women have reported to the Lactation Study Center
that their fresh-frozen
breast milk smells sour and even rancid and is
rejected by their infant.
Although a slightly soapy odor had sometimes been
noted, it had never been
reported to be harmful nor to be rejected by the
infant. This soapy smell
has been attributed to a change in the lipid structure
associated with the
freeze-thaw effects of the self-defrost cycle in the
freezer-refrigerator.
The cases reported to the center, however, have
suggested true lipid
breakdown is associated witht he rancid smell. The
speculation was that some
women have more lipase activity than others, as noted
in the study of lipase
and hyperbilirubinemia. Some mothers reported that
their milk began to smell
as soon as it cooled, whether refrigerated or frozen.
Others have noted that
their stockpile of milk, meticulously stored in
anticipation of returning to
work, was rancid and rejected by their infant. When
these mothers heated
their milk to a scald ( not boiling) and then quickly
cooled and froze it,
the effect was not apparent and their infants accepted
the heat-treated
milk. That process inactivated the lipase and halted
the process of fat
digestion. On the other hand, scalding rancid milk
will not improve the
flavor or smell."
I seem to have a high lipase content in my milk. I
express, freeze and store in a freezer without an
automatic defrost cycle. Will the lipase activity
continue? should I scald before freezing and decrease
the quality of the milk? The milk is intended for a
baby who is not yet born, mother had had lactation
failure twice, but breastfed as she could. At this
point, I have no way of knowing if the soapy flavor
will cause the baby to reject the milk. I assume my
milk will be about half of the breastmilk this baby
receives for the first couple of months so I don't
want to feed her "inferior" milk that has the
immunological factors destroyed by scalding.
FWIW, my husband thought my elder daughter rejected my
expressed milk because of the soapy flavor, but I
suspect (now) that she was just offended by
alternative means of feeding.
there is nothing in the archives on this, so please
reply to the list. :-)
kate
=====
Kate Hallberg,http://www.cs.colorado.edu/~kolina/ mom to Ursula (6!), Sage (almost 4) and Benno (12-31-00) http://www.themestream.com/gspd_browse/reg/register_topic.gsp?auth_id=97400 Above all else: Sky.
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