Demographic

[ailbhe]

It's odd how many recently or hugely pregnant people I know, suddenly - I never did before I was pregnant myself. It's all a big conspiracy!

One by one, my family are asking me "What, you're not still breastfeeding her, are you? Why?" It's an effort to tell the truth - "Why not?" rather than come up with rational justifications along the lines of "WHO guidelines... NHS guidelines... The global average is over 3 years you know..." and, worst of all, "Because of her dairy intolerance." What am I doing, justifying myself like this? Feeding my baby is normal. Formula feeders don't have to suddenly justify why they haven't changed to something else at 9 months. Why is formula feeding more "grown up"? Why is breastfeeding only for young babies? What's wrong here?

Hi, choir.

Comments

Re: Oh no - breastfeeding at five months! And: who is Philip, anyway?

[pne.livejournal.com]

Surely she should be on bottles of formula-and-rice by now?

Oh, definitely.

I remember Stella being less than enthusiastic about the doctor's recommendation, at a routine checkup about six weeks ago, where the doctor strongly recommended introducing solid foods at four and a half months -- and added that she should buy little glasses of carrots rather than preparing them herself due to the levels of pesticides and other chemicals in "normal" food, whereas manufacturers of baby food control this more carefully. But she also said that a week or two after introducing carrots, she could introduce potatoes, which she could just buy, cook, and mash... though don't potatoes and carrots grow in pretty much the same soil? So they should be both equally pesticide-laden. *shrugs* So yes, she'll be introducing steak and chips first thing tomorrow morning.

Anyway, she plans to breastfeed exclusively until at least six months, and possibly longer (eight or nine months, perhaps) if Amy cooperates, since Amy is at risk for allergies because of me, and breastfeeding exclusively for a bit longer is supposed to help reduce the incidence and severity of allergies. She's also now strongly considering switching pædiatricians, since she's not happy with the advice she got from the current one.

still has no clear idea who Philip, Stella and Amy are

Well... I'm Philip. I first saw you in afp, back when I still read Usenet regularly, and liked your name. Occasionally, I'd have a look at your web page. I sent you an email once (8 May 2000) asking you whether my guess at the pronunciation ("Alvey") was correct or not, and you replied (11 May 2000) that it was "More like Alver or Alvuh" and that "It's on the website :)" ("The website" being, presumably, the http://library.lspace.org/~ailbhe/ that was linked in the signature of that email, which now gives me "403 Forbidden".)

I think that email may have been the only contact you had with me, so it's not surprising you don't know me.

At some point, I came across you on LiveJournal, found out that ailbhe was the Ailbhe Leamy I had "known" before, and added you, and I've followed your journal ever since, commenting occasionally. I suppose you could call me a stalker, though not a very obtrusive(?) one. Now that we've both got children, we have slightly more in common than before, though you still don't know me and I don't really know you, either.

And Stella and Amy are my wife and daughter, respectively, though I imagine you've gathered that much.

who is Philip, anyway?

[pne.livejournal.com]

I sent you an email once (8 May 2000)

This was in response to this Usenet message of yours (or 8es4b9$3th$1@leprechaun.ossifrage.net, should it still be available on your computer or news server, for some reason...).

Re: who is Philip, anyway?

[ailbhe]

I seem to have had a reason for posting it, at least. I've forgotten it, thank goodness.

Re: Oh no - breastfeeding at five months! And: who is Philip, anyway?

[ailbhe]

I remember Stella being less than enthusiastic about the doctor's recommendation, at a routine checkup about six weeks ago, where the doctor strongly recommended introducing solid foods at four and a half months -- and added that she should buy little glasses of carrots rather than preparing them herself due to the levels of pesticides and other chemicals in "normal" food, whereas manufacturers of baby food control this more carefully. But she also said that a week or two after introducing carrots, she could introduce potatoes, which she could just buy, cook, and mash... though don't potatoes and carrots grow in pretty much the same soil? So they should be both equally pesticide-laden. *shrugs* So yes, she'll be introducing steak and chips first thing tomorrow morning.

Linnea got solids at about 16 weeks - up to a millilitre of mashed banana! She wanted it. I imagine Stella will know when Amy wants solids, too, and introduce non-allergenic foods gradually. We're working on introducing gluten now, but it makes me very nervous.

Pesticides - I use organic-certified food, and when we're out, we use organic pre-bottled babyfood, because I can't pack it in as sterile an environment, and the jars are useful if I'm going to be going from hot to old to hot to cold, on and off buses and in and out of shops. And I consider fruit skins to be a sanitary wrapping, too.

Stalker - heh. Who put her diary on the internet?

A.