To think that toddler milk is a marketing con?

[MumNWLondon]

I am currently BFing my baby and hadn't realised how expensive formula was (well I'd forgotten as older DC haven't had it for a while).

What I don't understand is why anyone would continue to pay for formula past one year when cows milk can be given? (Unless money is literally is no object etc)

Before anyone says my DD will not drink cows milk, mine didn't either took 6 more weeks and 2 more tubs to move from 7oz of formula to 6oz formula 1oz cows milk, 5oz formula 2oz cows milk etc.

So who buys this stuff and why?

[MumNWLondon]

So most people here agree - healthy toddlers don't need to drink toddler milk, which despite perhaps being nutritionally superior to cows milk, actually isn't essential or helpful for toddlers eating a balanced diet.

I think formula manufacturers just saw a new market, and use clever advertising of toddlers with "glows" around then to make us feel that toddler milk is better than cows milk.

re: vit D deficiency - need to get outside more thats all.

[pigletmania]

Awwww dame it boobja . Thanks for the links, Of course it is up to you what you do and are entitled to your opinions, we are free thinking inviduals who can do what we like and if we like cows milk so what!! We are happy with cows milk, though mabey my Eczema would say otherwise and my dd 3.5 is a happy and healthy little girl. My goodness she puts far worse things in her mouth so a bit of cows milk wont harm.

[milliemoosmum]

I definitely wouldn't blame yourself for her allergy. The current advice is to eat nuts if you are not an allergy prone family so you followed it to the letter!
I avoided nuts in pregnancy but my mum has atopic excema, I suffer migraines, my sister and husband have hayfever and my husband had childhood asthma so that was why.

[LetsHaveAnotherOne]

I did eat masses of peanut butter (and gained a lot of weight!) in my pregnancy with her and I always felt guilty about it since discovering her allergy - and then the interim advice that was to avoid nuts in pregnancy...In theory then she should NOT have peanut allergy based on what I ate in pregnancy.
We must be the exception to the rule then.

[milliemoosmum]

Ah I see! Well it is possible to be the first in a family to have an allergy (obviously or no-one would ever have had one) but it is not generally advised that everyone avoids nuts just in case. Obviously it is right that you avoid nut products for your other kids as they now have a higher risk.
I think the nuts in pregnancy advice has changed due to research showing that if your unborn child does not have an allergy avoiding nuts altogether can increase their risk of developing one.

[LetsHaveAnotherOne]

We are not an allergy prone family - with no other members having asthma eczema or other allergies prior to my daughter having her allergy to nuts.
My other children do all have to avoid nuts now as a consequence of the eldest having such a bad reaction.
Another nut my daugther tested as VERY allergic to in tests was the almond. Almond oil being in the cradle cap treatment used on her scalp as a baby (just ordinary over the counter stuff from boots - nothing special). So, I think what I'm saying is that I personally am sceptical about getting babies in contact with nut products due to my personal experiences.

[LetsHaveAnotherOne]

My eldest child now has severe nut allergy - (I used kamillosan nipple cream while breastfeeding which at the time contained peanut oil). Her allergy was discovered when she was first given peanut butter at 8m old - and she went into anapylactic shock. Ever since she has had to take adrenaline pens with her.

Prior to her reaction - nobody else in the family was known to have any allergy.

She herself did have eczema though. (associated with a raised ige count).

At one time the governments chief medical officer advised all mums not to eat nuts in pregnancy or give products containing nuts to children if there was a history of asthma or eczema in the family. I thought this was very sensible advice and wonder why it has been changed now. Had this advice been available when my eldest was a baby we might have avoided her being sensitised to nuts in the first place.

sloanypony thank for the idea for the biocare supplements - although it would cost me more to buy those than just to buy the toddler milk and have the same vitamins/minerals/prebiotics. It's an option though if money isn't a problem.

[SloanyPony]

Agree though that cost wise, it will bump you up closer to just buying the Growing Up stuff. But for anyone who has had trouble finding a suitable supplement, you get what you pay for in this case (see above link)

[SloanyPony]

This one is good and from 6 months

[milliemoosmum]

LetsHaveAnotherOne - as has already been mentioned you can get supplements free on the NHS and it is very unlikely that a healthy toddler would need them.
It is also not advised to avoid nut products unless you have an allergy prone family. They are full of protein. Whole nuts should be avoided for under 5's due to the choking risk but nut products such as peanut butter are fine.

[SloanyPony]

Have you tried biocare for supplements?

Hold on a sec I'll just check if the one I'm thinking of is suitable

[LetsHaveAnotherOne]

sloanypony I think all the Toddler milks are vanilla flavoured. Probably to disguise the taste of the added vitamins/iron and make it palatable to the toddlers.

My toddler is happy to drink either toddler milk or cowsmilk. He was perfectly happy on breast milk also before that dried up. despite me using a breastpump to try and increase my supply. It just dried up around 12 - 18m as he decreased his desire to feed at the breast. He was co-sleeping too.

[LetsHaveAnotherOne]

Yes you could feed cows milk - and a multi vitamin/iron suplement too - which would cost a similar price to the toddler formulae ....and the multi vitamin might contain peanut oil (associated with the rise in peanut allergy in this country).

Toddler milk does not contain any nut product.

Aptamil growing up milk £7.99 for 900g
1 scoop to 1 oz of water to reconstitute
1 scoop = 5g
900g divided by 5g = 180 scoops that would make up 180 fluid oz's of formulae which is
9 pints. (uk pints have 20 fluid ounces)
so - that's 9 pints of toddler milk for £7.99

Or if you buy cow and gate 1y + milk only £5.94 for 9 pints.

Tesco whole milk works out at £3.87 for 9 pints + Abidec multivitamin drops at £3.99 - £5.19 for 25mls (last time I looked these contained peanut oil so I would not be feeding them to my infant anyway). These vitamin drops do not contain iron either. Yes there are other vitamins on the market - have a look around and see if you can find some that are multivitamins/minerals & iron and are also nut free for children who are under 3 years of age. I'd be most interested if you can find any (seriosuly) because I haven't managed to find any yet.

So for this reason - although I prefer to breastfeed I don't think the toddler milk is either a con. I think some people will find it a very useful product to have available should they choose to purchase it.

[BoojaB]

Pigletmania, I'd rather go to a breast milk bank than give my child cows' milk. My boob juice has all finished now though, sorry chuck! :)

Have you tried Alpro banana milkshake? If you can't do soya, try rice milk, almond milk (LOADS of calcium in that) or oat milk? There are plenty of vegetable margarines which are dairy-free too, such as Pure or Vitalite. There are also lots of non-dairy vcreams too. After trying Swedish Glace dairy-free ice cream (www.swedishglace.com/), you'll never look back!

Sorry, I know this is really lazy but here are more links (apologies that they're US) for more info:
thebabybond.com/MilkingYourBones.html
www.milksucks.com/osteo.asp

I have a cup and tea and a Hob Nob to finish ooff now, before DD wakes up!

[SloanyPony]

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the Cow & Gate growing up milk (so the one from 1 year) have vanilla in it?

See that is sneaky, make it taste like custard so they'll never drink cows milk!!!

[MathsMadMummy]

dammit I want KFC now

oh and my HV was surprised and very impressed that I was eschewing the follow-on milk in favour of cow's milk.

[MathsMadMummy]

I thought toddler milk was really sweet. I switched DD onto cow's milk as soon as she turned one, she did have toddler milk a couple of times for convenience but it smells foul. they don't need that stuff if their diet is healthy IMO

DS nearly 1, but not planning to stop BFing for ages yet so not an issue, but he does have cow's milk in cheese sauces, porridge etc.

[moondog]

Comforting thought.

[SloanyPony]

Oh, and salt is fortified with iodine.

So if you like your KFC, you wont be getting a goiter any time soon. Well. That's something, eh?

[moondog]

God, do so, really, and stop worrying.
I don't give a hoot about what my kids eat (within context of what offered to them) as I know it will all work out fine.

[MarthaQuest]

Right, moondog and sloany , after reading your wise words and the rest of this thread I have decided to ditch the rest of dd's toddler formula and let her take her chances with the rest of us.

[SeaTrek]

YANBU

I BF my son until he was 12 months, he then took cow's milk no problem and he was totally weaned off me by 14 months. Like diddl, it never occured to me to put him onto formula then. I know that you should ideally BF until 2+ year but most health professionals say that cow's milk is fine from 12 months so I went with that. If it wasn't then I would have made myself BF for longer having got that far without artificial milk.

[SloanyPony]

Apparently when it comes to bone health, being active plays a big part. This goes for adults as well but I wonder what the more sedentary lifestyle might have on the effect of the bones of the next generation? Hopefully nothing too tangible.

Also, in relation to bioavailability and absorbtion, even spinach has its drawbacks - the oxalate content in spinach also binds with calcium, decreasing its absorption.

There is mandatory fortification of flour in the UK under the bread and flour regulations 1998. Flour has calcium carbonate (chalk), iron, thiamin (vitamin B1) and nicotinic acid or nicotinamide. It must be added to all (including organically produced and imported) wheat flour made available in Britain.

Cereal is fortified with folic acid. Come to think of it I think this is voluntary fortification and not because of law, I'd have to check that.

If anyone is worried about Vitamin D, consider using margarine if you dont already, as that is fortified by law in the UK. If you have some margarine each day, you are unlikely to suffer from too bad a deficiency.

One of the reasons its difficult to become nutrient deficient in the UK is because of fortificaton. These laws came into place because there were problems with rickets and other nutrient deficiencies. To be too about formula because it has been fortified is a bit inconsistent but to be annoyed with the marketing of it because you can get your vitamins from other fortified and non fortified products is probably justified - but to be consistent you might want to get equally arsey with any fortified product that mentions that it is a good source of a certain nutrient in its marketing. And there are PLENTY out there.

[moondog]

Martha, in the developed world we all get enough of everything generally speaking. If you ran exhaustive tests you would maybe find person x is lacking slightly in y but really, so bloody what.

Advertising exhausts to let paranoid thoughts seep into our brains and to have us rushing out spending money on things we don't need.