GreenSmoothieGirl Logo
Lose 10 Pounds in 10 Minutes. Add 10 Years to your life.
Our beautiful template for infinite variety of greens and superfoods in your smoothies—print this and eliminate the need for recipes! Get it now for free!

Nutrition for pregnant moms, babies, toddlers: part 2 of 5


Robyn Openshaw - Oct 19, 2012 - This Post May Contain Affiliate Links


Breastfeeding versus formula is our topic today.

First of all let’s talk about how long to nurse your baby.

We’ve over-sexualized breasts in our culture. We’re squeamish about the use of breasts for feeding babies.

Cover it up, don’t let anyone know you do it, get your boobs back as fast as you can for their main purposes, and perish the thought that they LOOK like they nursed babies!

I’m not suggesting they aren’t sexual, okay? Nor that we should give up looking good. Not my point. Here’s what I’m saying.

Young moms, if your baby needs your breast milk for 6-9 months longer than most people do it, for her brain health, for her budding immune system, for her pancreas and liver to finish developing…..will you do it? Or is doing what everybody else does more important?

(Look how it’s working out for them. We’ve NEVER had so much degenerative and neurological and congenital disease, at young ages, in the history of the world.)

Your baby needs breast milk for 18 months. I nursed my last child till he was 21 months old. He was my healthiest child, never got sick, never has visited the doctor for illness, never has needed an antibiotic or any other drug.

But because I nursed him so long, one day he ran over to me when we were watching his sister’s soccer game. At nearly 2 years old, poked me in the chest with his finger, and yelled:

“Nurse you!”

(Yes, I was embarrassed. I am not a hippie. I do care what people think. However, I’m just not going to do the wrong thing for my child out of peer pressure. I was about done nursing anyway, and that embarrassing little incident pinkie-pushed me, pun intended, into quitting.)

But young mothers are not taught that the body does not produce and release digestive enzymes at birth. The infant body is programmed to receive human breast milk, which is rich in its own enzymes. Digestion of human breast milk is easy for an infant and a toddler. Part of the genius of each species is that the milk adapts and becomes precisely what the baby needs, at each stage of development.

What a tragedy, then, when we deny our babies this birthright. When companies like Enfamil and Similac convince mothers in the hospital, all over the world, including now in poor Latin nations, to take home a whole case of formula. (It’s free!) Formula manufacturers know if they get you before you leave the hospital, any milk they give your baby is milk your body then doesn’t produce, so you will not be able to give your baby a full supply of breast milk. Unless you’re very careful.

Plus your baby will become used to fake foods, instead of quickly developing a taste for human milk, making him that much less likely to reject formula later.

Of course, cooked baby formula, cooked and processed, has no enzymes, and this begins heavily taxing the infant body and causing it to produce mucous. Not to mention you’re fighting the antibiotics and steroids fed the cow, and the terrible food supply of GMO corn and soy products.

A buildup of mucous creates an acidic climate to invite infections, both bacterial and viral. Breastfed babies get sick far less than formula-fed babies. Everyone knows this. But I’ve just described one of the reasons why.

So you can’t nurse. Or you’ve adopted. Or you want to wean the baby. What do you wean her onto?

My friend Dr. Ritamarie Lozcalzo was an adoptive mother to two children who are now young adults. She is a raw vegan and nutrition expert and a prominent internet personality. She developed a high-nutrition, raw baby formula using nut milk, vegetable juices, and some specific supplements that include the right fats babies need. I’m always sending young moms to her, but you can get her formula recipe here if exclusive breast feeding is not an option.

If you won’t make your own formula, I would look for an ORGANIC goat-milk formula. If you can’t find that, an ORGANIC dairy formula. Soy formula would be my last choice.

I personally weaned my babies, once I learned not to use cow milk and baby formula, onto whole, raw goat milk.

Your instant reaction is to fear the word “RAW.” Doesn’t pasteurization of milk kill all the bad bacteria that might hurt your baby?

Yes. And no.

It kills the bacteria. There can be some bad bacteria in milk. There’s bad bacteria in your body right now—some really deadly stuff, actually. It’s in a teeming metropolis of bacteria, actually. Think of it as the Manhattan of living organisms, what’s going on in your gut, tissues, and bloodstream as you read this.

There are pathogens there. Molds. Fungus, bacteria, cancer. Not only now, but 10 years ago too. And 10 years from now.

But even organisms you think of as “bad” play an important role, often. It’s not fully understood, but I did a fascinating recorded call with Dr. Jack Tips, PhD, N.D., recently, for the Detox program I’ve been developing for over a year. He discussed how even bad bacteria play good roles. Even candida. The thriving metropolis has an intelligence that is crippled and devastated with the atom-bomb approach of antibiotics.

And when you pasteurize the milk, you also kill all the GOOD bacteria. You kill everybody and everything, machine-gun style. You kill all the enzymes that make the raw food easy to digest.

So killing stuff isn’t the answer.

Establishing, nurturing, and maintaining a healthy environment in your body, where GOOD bacteria flourish, and bad bacteria are managed and controlled, never making you sick, is the answer.

Eating foods that are organic, and living, and whole, is the main answer.

So like I said, I weaned my babies onto raw goat’s milk. You have to go out of your way to find it. The dairy industry has a chokehold on the FDA. Dairy spends $50 million a year in propaganda (read: advertising) to convince us we must drink and eat lots of dairy products to be healthy. One of their tactics is to drive out competition. So you can’t buy unpasteurized goat milk as “food.” You can ask around, at health food stores and with people who have been studying nutrition for years, and find the little goat dairies.

They will sell it to you—for other purposes, not food. (What YOU do with it is up to you.)

My four children drank it for many, many years, without incident. Before I began using it, I studied it, and discovered that no one in the Western United States had registered any complaint, about any goat-milk problem, in the previous 10 years.

(The same cannot be said about cow-milk dairies.)

I also learned to make yogurt out of raw goat milk. Later, I learned to make an even better food: KEFIR. It not only supports healthy flora in the gut, it can re-establish it, build it from the ground up. It does not require heating the milk. It’s very easy and simple, and costs next-to-nothing, as the live kefir grains are infinitely re-useable.

Learn about kefir HERE. It’s a vastly superior food to the raw milk itself, because the culturing (or fermenting) process breaks down the proteins in the milk to be essentially “pre-digested.” Goat milk is not mucous forming for humans. Neither is goat-milk kefir or yogurt.

Tomorrow, what do I wean my baby onto, besides raw goat milk? We discuss a progression of foods to introduce.

Posted in: Health Concerns, Relationships, Whole Food

14 thoughts on “Nutrition for pregnant moms, babies, toddlers: part 2 of 5”

Leave a Comment
  1. Anonymous says:

    Thanks so much for writing about this subject!

  2. Anonymous says:

    I breastfed my kids till they were almost 2 each. When my daughter was born I needed to have surgery to remove my gallbladder (thank you, years of SAD eating) and only had a couple weeks to nurse her and pump. I did supplement her a little with goats milk that I bought at the store. It didn’t hurt her at all. She was about 3 weeks old when she first drank it. Then happily went back to momma when I was able to (48 hours post surgery).

    The only bad thing I can say about breastfeeding is that when you introduce whole foods (my daughter only ate whole foods I made and green smoothies at age 6 months plus breastmilk) is that it caused her to get cavities. My Dentist explained that breastmilk is perfect and then when you introduce foods, it acts as a bacteria food supply and thus eats away at their teeth. My daughter had to have surgery age 18 months to remove both of her front teeth because of my night time breast feeding but I still wouldn’t change that and she has adapted.

    1. Kat says:

      I’ve actually heard that it’s the lack of brushing teeth, not the nighttime breastfeeding, that aids in cavity formation. If you brush child’s teeth, you are fine to nurse at night because you have removed the harmful part/bacteria in the equation.

  3. Anonymous says:

    Thank you so much for posting this series. I have a 14 month old who I’ve been feeding pumped breast milk to up until a few weeks ago. I’ve been buying goats milk in powdered form from our local Walmart (which in all honesty is the only store I buy stuff at because it is convenient, close, and I can price match – which is important to me since I feel crazy busy as a Mom with 4 little kids 7 and younger). I know raw goats milk is best but how would powdered goats milk rank? I’ve also been feeding my baby almond milk and rice milk but my doc. thinks they don’t have enough fat in them. I prefer them over cows milk though. So I’ve been doing it anyway. Sure do love your blog and all the good research you do for us out here in the blogging world. Thanks for helping Moms like me!

  4. Anonymous says:

    Robyn, Just last week I was going to email you and ask you to please publish something about what to feed babies and toddlers. I know what I do, but SO MANY MOMS out there are SOOOO misinformed. I’ve needed some more direction to give others as well as myself for a very long time. Thank you! What pregnant women should/need to eat is another topic full of misinformation. I can’t wait to read the part on that.

  5. Anonymous says:

    Robyn, I look forward to reading the rest of this series! I just started feeding solids to my 9 month twins a short while ago. They have been exclusively breastfed and have been the most content of all my babies. For solids, we started with blackberries, avocados, squash (t’is the season!), and green smoothies, of course! The girls LOVED the green smoothie today which consisted of spinach, pears, and berries. Yum! I gave them my mommy lecture on how the green smoothie is a nutritional powerhouse (for the benefit of my older girls who just so happened to be listening in). I love having a clear nutritional focus when it comes to feeding my girls. 🙂

  6. Anonymous says:

    Is weaning baby onto milk (of any kind) necessary or recommended? With my 1st, I had quit dairy because of her intolerance-and thus began my journey into better health-but at that time I just didn’t bother with milks at all until she was older, and then it was rice milk (or soy. I hadn’t gotten to soy research yet! Wish I would’ve found you 4 years sooner!) anyway, with #2 I’ve been planning on water and smoothies after breastfeeding. But I live by a goat dairy, so I could easily get goat’s milk if there’s a nutritional benefit to prolonging her exposure to milk…?

  7. Anonymous says:

    Sarah, I’d look to see where that goat milk powder is made. If it’s China, no doubt there is something harmful in it!

  8. Anonymous says:

    @Sarah – PLEASE tell me you are not exclusively feeding your baby nut milk. It doesn’t have the crucial fats babies need for healthy brain development. Goats milk is a HUGE improvement over the raw nut milk (at least for babies and toddlers). These nut “milks” alone are missing a lot of protein as well as other nutrients. Please research the recipes for natural homemade formula and they all have a lot of fats and protein added for health of baby!

  9. I love that you are talking about the wonders of breastfeeding and encouraging women to do so as long as they can! I was shocked, however, that you would even mention the idea of using soy milk as some sort of milk substitute, even as a last resort. Soy milk nearly always comes from genetically modified soy beans and is one of the most highly processed foods out there. Here are some important soy bullet points that I am sure you already know, which is why I am confused at your mention of it as a possible milk for babies…
    *High levels of phytic acid in soy reduce assimilation of calcium, magnesium, copper, iron and zinc. High phytate diets have caused growth problems in children. Phytates are not neutralized through soaking or sprouting like other grains. Soy beans must be fermented for a very long time and they do not ferment them for soy milk.
    *Trypsin inhibitors in soy interfere with protein digestion and can stunt growth.
    *Soy phytoestrogens disrupt endocrine function and have the potential to cause infertility and promote breast cancer.
    *Soy phytoestrogens are potent antithyroid agents that cause hypothyroidism and may even cause thyroid cancer.
    *In infants, consumption of soy formula has been linked to autoimmune thyroid disease.
    *Soy increases the body’s need for Vitamin B12
    *Soy foods increase the body’s requirement for vitamin D.
    *Processing of soy protein results in the formation of toxic lysinoalanine and highly carcinogenic nitrosamines.
    *MSG, a potent neurotoxin you frequently warn against, is formed during soy food processing.
    *Soy foods contain high levels of aluminum which is toxic to the nervous system and the kidneys.
    *A lot of children have allergies to soy
    *”Infants exclusively fed soy formula receive the estrogenic equivalent of at least 5 birth control pills a day.” (Irvine et al. 1998) I know you didn’t say anything about soy formula, but soy milk and soy formula are both made from soy and I assume would have similar effects.

    Please change your recommendation. Soy milk and unfermented soy products are not good for anyone, especially babies.

  10. Deena says:

    Robyn,

    I picked on soy because in the post you were talking about formula options and said that soy formula would be your last choice. I really don’t think it should be mentioned as an option. Soy formula is bad stuff. Thanks for your response!

  11. Sheila says:

    help! I just read this article and my 10 month old baby has been drinking Similac Soy since birth. How bad is Soy that you say it would be your last choice?

    1. Sheila says:

      I just left a comment about my 10 month old baby drinking Soy milk since birth. I had no knowledge of this. Breastfeeding didn’t go as planned for me. He was not latching and i wasn’t producing enough. i finally put him on formula thinking it wasn’t that bad. My baby did not take well the regular formula so the Dr changed it to Soy. Am i able to change immediately? And what can i change to? Do you think drinking soy formula did any damage to my baby? or can it be reversed? please help

  12. CCRocker#1 says:

    What are good brands to use of powdered goat milk? I’ve searched the internet and alot of sites are foreign and they do not distribute to the US. Need help moms!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


Skip to content