Myth #1: Colostrum is poison
The perhaps best known myth about human milk relates to the
first milk – colostrum. Many, many cultures have strong beliefs and folklore
about colostrum. The most common belief is that colostrum is bad and should not
be given to the infant.
As far back as the 1500s, it was regularly suggested that
infants should be breastfed by another woman for the first three to fourteen
days of life, or sometimes as long as two months, because her milk was “not
healthy”. Colostrum especially, because of its sharp visual contrast to mature
milk, has had numerous beliefs about it. Some physicians at the time
recommended feeding colostrum to a puppy or an adult in order to maintain milk
supply. If the mother had to nurse, she should first give the child honey.
Gruel was also an acceptable substitute.
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| Figure 1: Puppies should not nurse from humans. Dressing them as nurses on Halloween though, is totally okay. Photo: Pinterest. |
Yeah, you read that right. Women’s colostrum, the thick,
wonderful substance commonly called “liquid gold” because of its richness in
immune factors and benefits to the infant was fed to puppies. It is almost
certain this contributed to both infant and maternal morbidity and mortality,
as newborn infants received consider immunological support from the
immunoglobulins in milk and mothers nursing puppies may have been at increased
risk of mastitis. “Milk fever” was at one point considered a stage of lactation
(Obladen, 2012).
Fortunately, by around the 1750s, a few physicians figured
out that this was probably not the best advice, and started recommending infant
breastfeeding within a few hours of birth. This had a beneficial effect on
infant mortality rates, as it turns out puppies aren’t very good at removing
milk, and too often, by the time the 3-14 days had passed, the woman had no
milk and would have to rely on animal milks or gruels and paps.
The scary part? In many parts of the world, myths persist
about colostrum. In my work in Tibetan communities in the highlands of Nepal,
more than half the mothers did not breastfeed their infant for the first 3 days
and about 10% told us that the first milk was poisonous. When we asked why,
several reported that a nurse had provided that piece of information.
Myth #2: Bad behavior makes bad milk
If you are what you eat, then you are what you make for
someone else to eat, or so the story goes. It was long believed that maternal
characteristics were in the milk, and while an upstanding lady with a good
husband might make good, upstanding milk, she probably wasn’t nursing the baby
– a wet nurse was. And finding a good, morally upright wet nurse (that is,
someone to nurse your child instead of their own) was a bit complicated. If her
baby had died, was her milk any good? If her baby was born out of wedlock,
would she pass “moral looseness” onto the child? The ideal candidate was a
morally upstanding, lower middle class woman with her own child . . .who could
be farmed out to a lower class woman for cheaper wet nursing . . .who could
feed her child gruel or other substitutes.
And of course, the wet nurse had to be not only morally upright but free
from hysteria, angry thoughts, and “violent afflictions of the mind” that might
give the baby rickets, or epilepsy.
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| Figure 2: Darth Vader as a baby. Likely candidate for moral failings, but blaming milk seems a bit over the top. Unless the Emperor was nursing. |
Rickets of course, comes from a lack of Vitamin D, not afflictions
of the mind, and epilepsy is not linked with milk in any way shape or form.
What is described here is control over women, and specifically control over
women’s bodies and reproductive potential. Delicate upper class women could
certainly nurse – but because of high childhood mortality, were often instead
relegated to repeated, closely spaced pregnancies while infants were fed by
wet nurses or artificial means. Their capacity to bear numerous legitimate
heirs for a husband was more important than their role in keeping the child
alive. Additionally, the idea that bad behavior in milk could affect the infant
was a means of social control, limiting women’s capacity to act, circumscribing
their behavior and using infant morbidity and mortality as a means of social
control over women.
Sadly, as with the colostrum myths, ideas about maternal
behavior and milk quality continue to this day in many parts of the world. An
example of this comes from rural Bangladesh, where young married women’s low
status within their husband’s families are often associated with limited food
and harsh treatment, especially from mother in laws. Many women will substitute
paps or gruels for milk, told that their milk is bad because they are disobedient
or abused by their mother in law.
Myth #3: Breastfeeding makes your breasts sag
This one is one of my favorites, and is one you will often
hear whispered among contemporary American women. Breastfeeding makes your
boobs sag. You may have heard it. You may have said it. You may have thought
it. It may have been said to you.
But is it true?
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| Figure 3: This boob hat might sag during breastfeeding . . .from a milk coma! Hats by: https://www.etsy.com/listing/121258456/crocheted-baby-boob-nursing-hat-breast?ref=market |
NOPE!!!!!! Everyone take a deep breath and dance around with
that joyful news, because we once again have science on our side. Rinker et
al., (2007) looked at changes in the position of the mammary glands in women
who breastfed and women who did not. The results? There was no difference in
the amount of structural loss integrity (a nice way of saying sag) between the
women that breastfed and the women that used formula. It was pregnancy, not
breastfeeding that lead to the changes in collagen and support for the breasts!
On that happy note, have a nice Halloween, and remember:
colostrum = good, behavior doesn’t influence milk, and breastfeeding does not
cause breasts to sag.
