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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To ask what people did before formula?

450 replies

Annabelleinapickle · 21/03/2016 16:49

There's always a BF/FF debate but genuinely what did we do before formula existed? It worked fine then, people produced milk? Personally I think it's all the devices, unhealthy crap invented that has made our bodies less able.

OP posts:
MrsTerryPratchett · 21/03/2016 17:17

Don't forget that many women died in childbirth. So there was no one. They still do in many countries. Even if BFing was 'easy' wasn't for me many babies didn't (and still don't) have living mothers.

Samcro · 21/03/2016 17:20

i still have one of these tins(keep buttons in it) so assume it was mine . my mum was ill so couldn't bf.

To ask what people did before formula?
XIsACunt · 21/03/2016 17:21

My MIL used to give DH and SIL condensed milk. Apparently back then it was actually recommended and the norm. She said DH was such a hungry baby that her mother told her to add a rusk to his condensed milk (gross). The milk was so thick she cut the tip of the end of his teat so he could drink chew more like it.

MrsDeVere · 21/03/2016 17:22

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

OhtoblazeswithElvira · 21/03/2016 17:22

My uncle was fed cow's milk. My grandma says "he just wouldn't latch on, we tried everything, we couldn't find a way". He was absolutely fine. He was my grandma's 3rd child BTW (out of 4) - the other 3 were breastfed without any problems.

crappymummy · 21/03/2016 17:23

My grandmother was a wet nurse

dontbreathesomedays · 21/03/2016 17:24

My great aunt had a baby who starved in the 1950s.

KimmySchmit · 21/03/2016 17:24

Fil was raised on tinned condensed milk Shock

KimmySchmit · 21/03/2016 17:25

He was rotund as a baby but in his 80s & in good health now Grin

EllenJanethickerknickers · 21/03/2016 17:25

I was fed on National Dried Milk! I'm only 50. My mum breastfed my older sister and brother for a few weeks, then they were on to cows milk and Heinz chocolate pudding, but her milk didn't come in with me. My mum was quite careful with money and we had a few National Dried Milk tins used to store flour, sugar and one was a peg tin. Grin

I can remember reading the instructions on the side of the tin, how much to give babies at various ages and how many feeds. It included instructions on feeding a few ounces of defrosted frozen orange juice, as fresh or long life orange juice wasn't available or invented to make sure we had enough vitamin C. Don't remember anything about added vitamin D.

FinallyFreeFromItAll · 21/03/2016 17:25

Really? They starved?

Yes the babies of poor regularly died from "failure to thrive". It meant baby had effectively starved to death. It usually took months because baby managed to get some milk but not enough to grow or ultimately survive.

The rich had wet nurses - people who were proven breast feeders to feed their babies.

Then there was the fact that womens mothers had to have been successful in bf or they wouldn't have been here to have their own children (exception for the rich with their wet nurses). This obviously meant they were better placed to advise and help a new mother.

Then there's the fact that babies who weren't feeding well were often given things like a paste made of flour and water (still happens in less developed parts of the world) from weeks old. This was the desperate attempt to make a " failing to thrive" baby survive.

I'm glad I live in a era and a country where formula is fully available. I would never wish to return to a time or live in a place where infant death from "failure to thrive" is considered a sad fact of life.

EllenJanethickerknickers · 21/03/2016 17:26

Samcro that's the tin! Wow, brings back memories!

Badders123 · 21/03/2016 17:26

Babies died.
A lot.
On Dhs family there were at least 2 babies who had "failure to thrive" on their death certificate.
:(

AuntieStella · 21/03/2016 17:27

They made their own formula (which is, after all, just cows milk modified to make it more digestible).

If you look in baby care books from before tabout he 1950s, they include recipes for it.

Also, unmodified goat or sheep milk was a popular choice because it was readily available and more digestible than cow.

Badders123 · 21/03/2016 17:27

My fils grandmother used to give her babies carnation milk because it has sugar in!
She also dosed them on laudanum so she could go out to work :(

summerdreams · 21/03/2016 17:27

Wow another thread like this today! Premature, disabled, and motherless babies death rates were much higher the infant death rate would have been rediculous compared to what we're used to formula I doubt was only invented for convenience reasons.

EllenJanethickerknickers · 21/03/2016 17:28

And it does say vitamin D added. Does it say anything about orange juice or did I dream that?

Believeitornot · 21/03/2016 17:28

I thought death rates of infants went up as more and more "artificial" milks were introduced then, as it became properly standardised etc etc rates went down again. Artificial milks were introduced to "free" mothers from breastfeeding which is pretty labour intensive at the start. I could be making this up.

Death rates in developing countries will have a link to dirty water being used for formula. That's why nestle has such a bad rep - for advertising formula milk, providing free samples, which is expensive. Mothers then use it, they can't afford it and cannot go back to breastfeeding as their milk has dried up.

lucysnowe · 21/03/2016 17:28

Yes if you look at old household books there are quite often recipes for infant milk, various concoctions involving sugar, boiled milk, sometimes egg, beef broth etc. You can imagine some babies sucking it down more or less ok, but it must have given the others a pretty horrid tummy ache - or worse. Pap as I understand it was flour and water but I imagine it was whatever the poorest had to hand that was considered nourishing, and nearest mother's milk.

Wet nurses yes but I think they were sometimes a matter of fashion and at other times it was the 'fashion' for mothers to breastfeed themselves, if they could. The whole history and sociology of wet nurses is pretty interesting, there is good article about it here. I do think of it as a rich person's thing but IIRC Oliver Twist was nursed in the workhouse.

Bottles were a problem too and even more than made-up milk might have led to the death of many babies due to not being washed properly, letting bacteria build up. One of the most underrated inventions in history IMO is that of the boat-shaped bottle which could be washed more easily and probably saved millions of little lives.

Speaking personally I feel very lucky I was able to feed my two safely with milk that was able to be scientifically formulated, rather than come from a haphazard recipe, but I appreciate that it's nothing more than a much better version of the old infant milk, rather than anything particularly space age or revolutionary.

larry5 · 21/03/2016 17:28

When ds1 and ds2 were little (over 40 years ago) there were instructions on evaporated milk tins on how to make up feeds for babies. At least evaporated milk didn't have as much sugar in it as condensed milk.

WhenSheWasBadSheWasHorrid · 21/03/2016 17:29

I would have made a great wet nurse.

For some reason I found breastfeeding really easy - always had loads of milk. Could have easily taken on another baby (a good sleeper obviously).

Had I been alive 100+ years ago and a friends baby was starving I would have fed that baby too. I'm sure this must have been relatively common.

CheshireChat · 21/03/2016 17:29

Actually my mum BF a baby while she was there with me, this was only 25 years ago, albeit not in the UK. She thought it was quite nice.

CheshireChat · 21/03/2016 17:30

In hospital obviously.

SevenOhTwo · 21/03/2016 17:30

Read this (comprehensive and interesting overview of history of infant feeding, although I have only skim read).

Bottles or vessels for feeding infants animal miłk have been found dating back to 2000BC apparently, so the need to supplement or replace breastfeeding does not seem to be a new thing.

Formula in one form or another has been around since 1865, but only really took of in 1940s and 50s once more full of nutrients and better bottles developed.

Prior to formula becoming more popular, wet nursing or animal miłks were main ways to feed babies who could not bf.

Badders123 · 21/03/2016 17:31

Apparently the Romans would latch their baby onto a goat!

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