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Weaning

Find weaning advice from other Mumsnetters on our Weaning forum. Use our child development calendar for more information.

Original poster

What milk for vegan one year old?

15 replies

mmelody · 04/04/2008 13:09

Hi there, I am currently BF my 8.5 month DS. We are a vegetarian family though have not used dairy since early brestfeeding days and have no plans to start now. We will probably go fully vegan very soon... i plan to continue breastfeeding until DS is around one... but what then? The soy milk that we use seems very low in fat and I am loathe to give formula of any sort... What do other people give their little ones? Or is it a case of making sure the fats and calcium are found from other sources?

Id be grateful for any input.

Many thanks

OP posts:
OverMyDeadBody · 04/04/2008 13:12

My mum made her own high fat seed and nut milks for us as we had no dairy growing up. It's just a case of soaking seeds and nuts and then blending them up with water. Can post some recipes if you like?

terramum · 04/04/2008 13:15

Is carrying on with bfing an option?

OverMyDeadBody · 04/04/2008 13:24

Yep do you have to stop BFing at one?

Original poster
mmelody · 04/04/2008 13:26

Terramum, well im certainly not planning at stopping at exactly one year.. but we are planning another baby and my periods are so irregular since BF. I am also returning to work part time, I know it would probably be the best thing to do but I was just interested in alternative options.. OMDB that would be great thanks... I never thought of making my own.

OP posts:
doggiesayswoof · 04/04/2008 13:28

I'd carry on bf if I were you. That's the vegan society advice IIRC

(dh is vegan but in the end we decided dd would be veggie and have some dairy)

doggiesayswoof · 04/04/2008 13:29

Oh sorry, x-post. I'm intrigued about making your own as well - will watch with interest.

NotQuiteCockney · 04/04/2008 13:29

You can carry on BF and conceive, people do, particularly if you cut down on night feeds.

Original poster
mmelody · 04/04/2008 13:29

Thing is DS is such a boobaholic, he is a frequent feeder both day and night. If I could get him to space them out a bit and maybe drop some of the night feeds then we may be able to carry on a bit longer...but he shows no sign of wanting to slow up bless him.

OP posts:
doggiesayswoof · 04/04/2008 13:31

Mm ISWYM. I was lucky with DD - by that age she was not feeding at night and feeds were quite spaced out (and my cycle had gone back to normal).

I can see I would have felt differently about carrying on if I was in your position.

Original poster
mmelody · 04/04/2008 13:32

I know that continuing to BF is the best way forward for him.. I think we will just have to work at spacing them out a bit...

OP posts:
skyatnight · 04/04/2008 13:38

I would continue to bf too, if you can. We are not vegans but dd has oat and rice milk with added calcium, etc..

mummypig · 04/04/2008 13:46

hi I conceived while still bf ds2, although it did take longer than I had expected. I got some good advice from La Leche League about breastfeeding and fertility (there's also good stuff on kellymom.com but you might have seen that already). In the end I decided just to go with the flow and that my body would be ready when he was ready to cut down, if you see what I mean. I did initiate most of the cutting down on feeds rather than him, but not until he was older and understood my explanations a bit more. And I hope I did it with sensitivity so that he didn't feel he was missing out too much.

I think you can just make sure your ds has enough calcium etc from other sources - after all it's not necessary for children to have 'milk' after they have weaned, it's just that we are used to putting it on cereal etc. Ds1 was cow's milk intolerant when younger so even though we weren't vegan at the time I was depending on predominantly vegan sources for calcium. I weaned him off breastmilk at about 10 months (which I now regret) and we went onto soya formula which he then developed a further intolerance to. So after about a year he had no 'milk' for anything (even using calcium-enriched orange juice on cereal instead of rice milk) but has grown up terribly healthy . Now we all use rice milk (except dp who still has cow's milk) but I can understand your concern about it being pretty low fat for use for a baby/toddler.

OMD I would also be interested in the home-made recipes.

By the way there's loads of good advice about working and expressing, if you look in the archives here or contact one of the bf charities, so it doesn't have to be a reason to stop breastfeeding altogether.

terramum · 04/04/2008 13:55

If you aren't stopping bfing altogether then I wouldn't worry about introducing a new "milk" just yet. Just ensure he has a good varied diet of calcium rich veg etc. We aren't vegan/veggie so DS does have other dairy like cheese & yoghurt, but as we were bfing on demand saw no need to offer cows milk as another milk. Even now he only has one breastfeed every week or so he doesn't have cows milk unless he asks for it (which is probably once a week as well). He just has a good varied diet.

purpleduck · 04/04/2008 14:16

another vote for carrying on bf ing

good luck

Original poster
mmelody · 04/04/2008 17:31

Thanks for the info ladies.. Ive just come back from our GP where DS has just been diagnosed with eczema... so another good reason to carry on BF.

mummypig I am an avid reader of kellymom and I agree with you that its not strictly necessary for children to have 'milk' once weaned. (im currently reading The china project which makes some very interesting points).

DS is showing no signs of wanting to reduce BF just yet and am not back to work till July so I will just chill and go with the flow methinks... thanks ladies

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