Defying the Health Visitor: Goats Milk Formula!

[Pennymum]

My DD is 4 months old and I am giving her 1 bottle of Nanny goat infant nutrition a day, alongside ongoing breastfeeding. I've had the speil from my health visitor about her not being able to support/recommend my use of it, but then I also know a number of stories about cows milk intolerant babies being prescribed the same stuff. I even spoke to the manufacturer who said that they hit this problem all the time because of European regs, and that many babies in NZ, Oz and the USA are living on it! Any insights, views, wisdom welcome..... Thanks

Ooh yes, good point bumpybecky, Kellymom is fabulous!

Oh yeah I just made it up

Was it a full moon last night?! I noticed all the silly stuff to and deceided to leave well alone!

Anyway back to the OP. When I was nannying my boss (can;t remember her reasons why) decided to use goats milk formula and then goats milk, her DD didn;t seem to suffer at all. Not sure why it might be banned or not in the UK but I would recommend sticking around MN, there is a lot of support on here but it does sometimes get silly and there are very strong opinions on here. I guess you either love it or hate it but don;t make your mind up after one post!

pamplemousse I am not suggesting you made it up. But I am a silly lawyer who read herself sick when pregnant and even more so when producing a baby with special needs and i have not come across any suggestion that goats milk is a great idea because it is so easily digestible.

It is so easy to say something is widely known.

I used it with ds3 (before it was banned or whatever it was the EU did). He was much better on it than cows formula (he was older than your baby - around 1 year). He has digestive problems and seemed much more able to break down goats milk, it actually has a higher proportion of a different isomer of casein than friesian cows (same as is found in guernsey cows milk - google A1 and A2 milk if interested). We saw a huge change with ds3 when he switched to goats. All the boys have (unmodified) goats milk now, seems to reduce ds1's headbanging. Not sure whether that's because of its makeup or because it is digested more easily.

For the amount you're giving I would do the same.

Having looked at theat link or whatever it is 2 things spring to mind:

1. the evidence probably cost too much for the manufacturers to produce - I remember that being said at the time- seems entirely likely.
2. they're thinking along the usual lines of allergy. DS1's problem is autism and leaky gut; Ds3's is leaky gut therefore at high risk of autism potentially triggered by beta caseiomorphine. One theory without the remotest bit of actual clincial evidence currently surrounds A1 vs A2 milks. Having seen the difference in ds3 switching from cows to goats I can believe it's worth investigating.

pennymum

i give nanny 1 feed a day and have given nanny to 4 of my six

were i solely ff i dont think ii would give nanny solely but as a top up i like it

i had severe eczema as a child and none of mine have so far.I really like nanny and my dcs thrive on it. I know th hvs dont like it ...

hope it goes well

mrs turnip oddly dp and i have both noted that ds's poos ( sorry no other way to put it!) have not changed in texture or smell since introducing the nanny

he s 7 months old and the only thing i could think of was that it was not altering the gut fauna

pennymum, people asked reasonable and polite questions to try to understand a little more. That's all. No way of knowing from your OP whether you were aware of the reasons why goat milk is not recommended for infants in the UK or Europe - you asked for insights, views, wisdom and were pointed in the direction of more information.

Then there were a few silly posts about goats, because unfortunately your thread coincided with some other stuff elsewhere on MN.

The sensible posts were from people trying to respond to your request. Seems rather ungracious to attack people who spared a couple of minutes trying to help.

Ria- I suspect most people can cope with various changes to gut formula anyway. It's those at risk with dodgy gut flora (and therefore quite probably leaky guts) who will be most sensitive.

In ds3's case the changes were developmental and in pain reception (he stopped banging his head hard enough to hurt). DS3 is NT (although does have incomplete cows milk breakdown products in his urine), but his autistic brother has exactly the same reaction to foods that send him a little crazy (i.e reduced sensitivity to pain and frequent headbanging).

I thought this was another goat thread - Pennymum your timing couldn't have been worse. If you search the site for goat then you will see some of the threads and understand some of the strange responses you got.

I can't add anything to the discussion about the milk as I didn't know there was such a thing a goat's milk formula until reading this thread.

I have no experience with goats milk formula but when my ds was aged one and I stopped bf he had cows milk to drink. He immediately began to have very runny poos. After about 2 months I did some research - most of which indicated that it was "toddler diarrhoea" and wasn't a problem but some mentioned goats milk and I decided to give it a go. Within a day or two his poos were solid again. The only times when he had diarrhoea again was when he had fromage frais or similar to eat. I therefore am firmly in the camp that for some children goats milk is better than cows milk but that it wouldn't be a good idea to feed exclusively goats milk without a very compelling reason.

That report is a pile of crap. Why is goats milk so much worse that cows milk formula. I think its more about 'corporate sales' than anything else. Cows milk is nasty stuff, and my whole family have been much healthier since we came off it. We love goats milk and I will give it to my son as a drink. Formula is not something I would ever want to give my child anyway, something about dried powder gives me the shudders. But if I did have to use formula I would never use cows milk, or soy. I would rather do goats.

Also this gov want to hide any info on stuff that makes you more healthy and jab you with poison.

mrsturnip sorry to jump in and ask, but I clearly need educating on this one - What do you mean by leaky gut and dodgy gut fauna - I only ask as I am concerned about my daughters gut fauna as she is on long term antibiotics...

Does this potentially mean she is at higher risk of autism?

believer - it's a European directive not a UK one. The government followed the European advice not led it.

Your conspiracist views may well be right about many issues - but the gov deliberatly covering up the good news about goats milk is a little wacky!

believer, the experts who inform the ban on goats milk formula are not sales staff for formula companies. They are independent experts who know what they are doing, look carefully at all the evidence and do their level best to give the right, evidence-based advice.

Sadly conspiracy theorists who make up stuff about evidence-based nutritional advice can sometimes create real health problems in the people they mislead - and often do have an interest in scaring people, either by selling products or services.

and the point is goats' milk may well be fine for older children but NOT for small babies where milk is the only source of nutrition.

The OP is b/f so it may be fine as a top-up, I don't know, would be interesting to see if there is any decent evidence on this.

I never know if I did the right thing or not with my first two children but they were weaned from breast milk straight to fresh goat's milk (I bought a goat as it was cheaper than trying to find cartons of the milk).

They were having little 'bouts' of excema and I not only fed them a completely caprine diet but bathed them in the milk as well. My GP was horrified but we discovered that their excema was helped and eventually went away. I used it on my own psoriasis too.
Perhaps they would have grown out of it, I really don't know but they have both grown up to be very healthy individuals.

buying a goat is a serious commitment! Wow. I don't think anyone can argue with that level of devotion.

Madmouse sorry.
I frankly can't be bothered to go into the details as someone will only shout me down and tell me what the EU recommends.
I have PERSONALLY found it did my dd no harm. My friends and a lot of people who are like minded use goats milk above cows milk as its make up is closer to human milk (donkey milk is ideal apparently but I can't get that in Sainsburys, not even in Waitrose!).
I just wanted OP to know that not everyone thinks its bad and agrees with the sometimes silly EU rulings.

So the consensus seems to be that the EU says no but there are certainly a number of you out there who find it beneficial for your dcs. Ok, cool. I generally operate on the basis that mums know their own babies best

I am still interested (because I am a nosy cow )in any science behind goats milk. But I will get off lazy bum and google. Any recommendations?

Pennymum, I have 3 girls (4, 2 and 1) and we all drink fresh goats milk and i used formula after i stopped breastfeeding. we're really into it. so i hope that's a helpful thread? we swtiched as it has really reduced the chest infections/mucus in the head basically. My parents do soya but i wanted soemthing more nutritional. And soya tastes bad... (scared now of soya backlash!)

Madmouse;
From: www.dgc.co.nz/about.html
"Apha-s1 is the major casein protein present in cow milk and has been
identified as one of the major cow milk allergens. By contrast the major
casein in goat milk is ß-casein, and alpha-s2 casein is the main alpha
casein present."

From: www.askdrsears.com/html/3/t032400.asp also good
HTH

And with other nutrients they are actually very similar. I think there are more B vitamins actually in the goats' milk...