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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

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Original poster

Wet-nursing: Has anyone breastfed someone else's baby?

69 replies

Astrophe · 16/09/2006 13:16

Was just thinking about this the other day as my friend just had a baby and I am BFing mine...not that I'm planning on doing it, but it just struck me that I could, in theory, mind her baby and feed it...but then very thought of it makes me feel weird. And yet I know it was very common in the past, and possibly still is in some cultures.

OP posts:

Spidermama · 19/09/2006 17:54

nouni really?
Wow. It's not necessarily Muslim thing. I'm not muslim. I think it's more a woman thing. Or a mother thing. When a baby is hungry you feed it, with whatever method works for you and the baby.

Twiglett · 19/09/2006 17:56

eeeeeuuuuuuwwwwwwwwww

Spidermama · 19/09/2006 18:03

Twiglet do you really think that?
You poor thing.

You and I don't seem to agree on much these days do we?

Twiglett · 19/09/2006 18:07

you're right we don't

and may I say you have a beautifully patronising turn of phrase on you too

Issymum · 19/09/2006 18:09

This is a very tangential view: we adopted DD1 from Vietnam when she was just 4 months old. Up to that point she'd been breastfed by her birthmother. I have a very warm feeling about the fact that DD1 had the best nutritional start she could in the circumstances and that bonding experience of breast-feeding, even if I couldn't give it to her. Through our agent we gave the birth mother formula milk so that, in preparation for the adoption, she could slowly acclimatise DD1 to taking a bottle. The birth mother apparently didn't give the formula to DD1 but drank it herself to keep her strength up for breast feeding!! Given the birth mother's lack of access to sterilising equipment and sterilised water, probably a wise decision.

MarsLady · 19/09/2006 18:11

I have and would again if necessary.

Nothing wrong with it. Don't quite understand the ewwwwwss when people suggest breastfeeding someone else's baby. Bf is completely natural. If a woman wanted to breast feed and was unable or baby was unable to feed from the breast there are breastmilk banks available.

I suppose the ewwww factor is the fact that it is someone else's baby. Well let's be frank if bfing someone else's baby would save its life how much would the ewwwwww factor come in?

Original poster

Astrophe · 20/09/2006 08:15

I don't think its eeeww. But I think I would find it odd - thats not to say I wouldn't do it, or that other people shouldn't.

I think I would find it easier to feed someone elses (young) baby than I would to watch my son be fed by someone else (although if I were around to watch it then why wouldn't I be feeding him myself...) - its more the fact that breastfeeding is quite intimate than any issues with my baby actually drinking another woman's milk. As somebody else said on here, we drink cows' milk so...?

Nouni, I assume that all those who have fed another person's baby would have had the permission of the baby's mum - unless its a real mergency situation. I don't understand your post. Are you saying you wouldn't leave you baby with a Muslim for fear that they would breasfeed him/her?

OP posts:

noddyholder · 20/09/2006 08:19

I can't believe people think its yuck!I would have loved my ds to have had bm for a few weeks at the start as medication I needed meant I couldn't.

trinityshiftingherleatheryarse · 20/09/2006 08:20

I woul ddefinitely feed someone else baby is the dire situation arose and I know that I have friends that would do the same for me in the same circumstances

trinityshiftingherleatheryarse · 20/09/2006 08:20

sorry cam't type this morning, well ever really

fuzzywuzzy · 20/09/2006 08:28

Nouni NO no Muslim woman would breastfeed another child without the express permission of the childs parents, as has been said before, breasfeeding makes the children as siblings and they are not then allowed to marry when older...still trying to find out the reasoning behind that....

There's nothing in Islam advocating breasfeeding other peoples children on the sly FGS, I don't see it as icky as a lot of other mothers seem to but only because it is culturally acceptable where I'm from.

Pruni · 20/09/2006 08:36

Message withdrawn

lilymolly · 20/09/2006 09:23

Sorry girls. not being controversial, but I just find it a bit wierd and would never do it. Just my opinion of course would never condem anyone else for doing. Everyone is entitled to do what they find comfortable

yellowrose · 21/09/2006 10:31

I would be absolutely furious if any individual fed my baby formula without my consent. Thankfully I gave birth in a birth centre and was home the next day, so never any danger of that happening. However, I would love and adore any woman who fed my baby breastmilk in an emergency !

yellowrose · 21/09/2006 10:33

lily - is it LESS weird to feed a baby dried cow's milk out of a bottle with a plastic teat (without the parent's consent) then ???

trinityshiftingherleatheryarse · 21/09/2006 10:37

dd2 was special care for 3 days(just under observation) and when I had fed her twice in the day time the nurse asked me if I wanted her to be given formula at night so that I didn't have to get up. To be honest I was quite shocked that she would even ask that. I had already made it very clear that i wanted ti fully bf and if that meant being woken by the nurse and trailing up 3 florrs and along 2 very long corridirs in a dark hospital in the middle of the night then that is what i was going to do. If I had been too ill (unconscious or for whatever reason) to bf then I would have loved there to be the opportunity for a wet nurse.

equally when I left my dd2 at 8 weeks with a close friend of mine at a bf support group whilst I went to pick up dd1 from school, if anything had happened to delay my return and dd2 desperately needed feeding I weould have been very happy for another nursing mum to try and feed her rather than her be given formula.

CatBert · 21/09/2006 10:46

Woman I met recently, who was one of 7 children, and whose mother was very hippy (lived in communes and such when they were small) bf all hers until at least 4, and was sooo proficient at it, that for years after her children had stopped b/f could lactate at will when she heard a crying baby. She apparently, was forever feeding other people's babies in the communes.

I found this a lovely story! I think I could feed another baby, and if circumstances dictated, (like hospitalisation or another kind of sudden separation) I feel I would be glad and humbled if a friend offered to feed my baby if I could not.

FlameSparrow · 21/09/2006 11:03

My great gran was a wet nurse.

We have joked that my step sisters and I could all just share feeding (3 very close babies)... in reality - I would if there was an emergency, but I would happily give my expressed milk at any time. I have been very very temped with my step neice - she was very unsettled with b/feeding and out one evening she was getting so upset, her mum was getting upset, and I felt like I wanted to take her away somewhere quiet and give it a try so that eveyrone calmed down... I think if the sling hadn't finally settled her then her mum probably would have agreed!!!

lilymolly · 21/09/2006 11:46

oh yellow rose really NOT getting into argument about the horrible horrible poison of formula.{wink] Just expressing my opinion.

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