Can i drink sparkling water whilst breast feeding as tonic water is a no no?? Substitutes for drinks (no alcohol)

[Jellybabie3]

I'm not drinking alcohol but thought I could have sparkling water as a sub for tonic water but i have heard it's too high in sodium. What can i have??

Are things like sparkling fruit juices/grape juice ok-lower sodium maybe?
Never heard about high sodium in sparkling water, tonic water I understand because of the quinine in it.

Don’t drink Fanta: it makes the milk go yellow

It's too high in sodium to give to a baby, but surely you can drink it.

I'm baffled. But google says no??

I've never heard that high sodium in food/drink is transferred into breastmilk. There's already quite a lot of salt in breastmilk so how much tonic would you need to up the level significantly?

I'd take it fairly easy on the gin though...

Yes, absolutely. There are so many differing opinions floating around online, Kellymom is all evidence based/fact, that's who I trust when in doubt. Don't drive yourself mad. kellymom.com/nutrition/mothers-diet/mom-diet/

What's the source for the no sparkling water rule? I've googled it and the first result is from "all women." A list where I can go and add my own item(s) without any vetting.

There are a bunch of sites saying that carbonated drinks are a no-no because that gets into your breast milk... which isn't true otherwise we'd be fizzing at the tits.

I drink gin and tonic all the time, I often have one of the little cans in the evening! Never heard you can't drink it?

If either tonic or sparkling water was a genuine concern I suspect the NHS or Kellymom would mention them.

A glass
Of wine Is also fine if you fancy it by the way.

I drink shed loads of neat tonic water and have spent a lot of the last 6 years breastfeeding one baby or another and I’ve never ever heard that it should be avoided.

Ah i thought quinine was an issue? If not i will have tonic water!

Surely different brands of sparkling water have different levels of sodium. The trace minerals in water vary depending of the geology of their source. I believe Evian is one of the lowest sodium waters, but don’t think there’s a sparkling one.

What on earth...?

You can drink anything you want (except maybe skip the glass of milk if you have a child with CMPA). Being carbonated doesn't make water any higher in sodium, it's just dissolved carbon dioxide. Lots of still waters would be higher in sodium than lots of carbonated waters, and nobody's bats enough to think you can only drink specific brands of mineral water while breastfeeding. I also suspect you'd have to drink truly industrial quantities of tonic water to even get a detectable level of quinine in your blood, much less to pass it to the baby via your milk.

Great thanks! Tonic and lemon it is then for xmas!

Nina fizzing at the tits

That would have been a sight to behold

Don’t your kidneys filter out excess sodium? The reason that under ones can’t have too much is because their kidneys aren’t yet fully developed.

Agree with GetOff, Kellymom is all the searching you ever need.

Tesco apparently has a non-alcoholic gin this year...

And you can even have a gin with it if you want

Also loving fizzing at the tits!

Although I probably wouldn’t enjoy it if it happened

No definitely, regular milk spraying is bad enough without adding fizz to the mix

If this is true, it could put Sodastream out of business...

Fair enuf all, maybe it was a stupid question....i was suprised as anyone to see it pop up on google.

Need to find something to drink this xmas!!

I've stocked up on Shloer, I think I have five bottles now as Tesco have it on half price. Might also get some of the non alcoholic kopparberg as I enjoyed them when I was pregnant.

There is no reason to avoid alcohol when breastfeeding; it isn’t like pregnancy. I often had a glass of wine whilst actually feeding. Look at Kellymom.

There are very few dietary restrictions while breastfeeding, unless your baby has allergies. You can have pate, unpasteurised cheese, rare steak, a gin and tonic - all that stuff you may have steered clear of during pregnancy. It will do no harm while breastfeeding whatsoever. The fact that you are questioning the safety of something as innocuous as sparkling water worries me that you are following a lot of unnecessary restrictions that will ultimately make breastfeeding more difficult or frustrating and there is no need for that to be the case. Relax, breastfeeding is brilliant and once you’ve got it established it is brilliant, you are giving your baby something fantastic but it’s a very different mechanism to when the baby was in your womb and nourished via the placenta and things don’t travel through breastmilk in the same way.

Obviously, check medications and some people found caffeine had an effect on the baby but mine never had any kind of reaction to me drinking full strength coffee. Enjoy drinking whatever you like this Christmas!