Hi all,
I thought you might find it interesting to learn of my sister-in-law's
experience 3 1/2 years ago in trying to obtain donated milk for her first
child. I helped her get nursing established, and monitored her pretty
closely until the baby regained his birth weight. After that, I only spoke
with her on the phone. She called several times, and it seemed the baby was
colicky, and it APPEARED that he was having enough wet and stooled diapers
(in retrospect--enough wet but NOT enough stooled...) Anyway she called me
in a panic after his 2 month checkup, where it was found that he had only
gained 4 ounces in a month. They ran out and bought 5 different kinds of
formula; he rejected them all. I was currently nursing a 3 1/2 month old
myself, plus a 4 1/2 year old and 26 month old. I asked her if she wanted
some milk from me, thinking a first time mom would balk at this, but she did
not. Thus began a 6 week or so journey in which I pumped about a pint a day
for their baby, plus fed mine (Decided it was time to wean the 4 1/2 year old
at this point....there is a limit, even for us "overproducers".....)
Eventually I could not keep up with all of this, as we found that MY baby was
not gaining quite enough (in the beginning he was still gaining fine and I
had my pediatrician's blessing to pump for our nephew, until my own son's
weight gain slowed down). It was vital to keep my nephew on breastmilk only,
because my husband's brother has had a complete iliostomy due to severee
ulcerative colitis. My sister in law tried Reglan, herbs, pumping, etc and
still only produced about 2 ounces a feeding (as far as we could tell by
weighing the baby). After I needed to back off, they looked into buying
donated milk from a milk bank. What they found out really bothered
me....first of all, we could not find ANY milk banks near us in Michigan.
Secondly, they did find a bank somewhere that wanted $2.50/ounce for the milk
(!!!) Thirdly, they couldn't leave their home often because it would be
delivered via FedEx and they couldn't tell them when the truck might arrive.
I think we figured out that at that point, together with the milk she COULD
produce, that it would cost them over $2000 a month to get donated milk.
SO...you know the rest of the story. I gave them as much as I could, while
monitoring my own baby to make sure he resumed his weight gain. Then we had
to very, VERY gradually wean my nephew onto formula using a mixture of
breastmilk and formula. She managed to keep nursing him as much as she could
for six months, then couldn't take it any more. But we did feel gratified
that we kept the baby on exclusive breastmilk for 31/2 months. Their second
child was not so lucky....again my sister in law could not produce enough
milk, and again I had had a baby 5 days after she did. They chose to
supplement this new baby with formula from the start this time (fear, I
think...) The baby became VERY ill at about 3 weeks, and they did accept
donated milk again from me at that time, but seemed somewhat reluctant.
Anyway, this is a long story, but it bothers me greatly that the milk that
many of us would give freely would have such a price tag placed on
it...prohibitive for most families. My sister in law joked that I could make
a million by selling my milk.....but isn't that sad.
Just want you all to know how much I appreciated all the support after my
last post on my C-sections and breasfeeding experiences.
Betsy Koval
Lansing, MI
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