The post where I rant about the MCH nurse and her bullshit advice.

Last week Friday, I took Xander to the maternal and child health nurse for his 15-month check up. Mainly to take his height and weight and make sure everything is growing fine. Well, I left with a seriously sour taste in my mouth and it has left me annoyed for many many days now. Oh and Jude too. Without going into too much detail and ending up blabbering endlessly, Xander has been steadily falling off his weight percentiles since he was about 9 months old.

In the first 9 months of his life, he had been gaining weight really fast and at one point went up to the 75th percentile while his height was at the 95th percentile of the charts for babies his age. But he has since fallen off. Make no mistake, he is still gaining weight. Just not as quickly as he was in the first 9 months of his life. And I am okay with it.

In fact, I think that's the healthy way to grow. That and the fact that his daddy and I both grew up tall, skinny and at some points, severely underweight. It is in our genes and no amount of eating could have changed it. Goodness knows I ate like I was starving all the time and ate just about anything and everything that was put in front of me. But I stayed skinny.

I always knew that our children would be the same too and that's okay. The main thing is for them to be healthy and to be growing well. Looking at Xander, he looks to be as healthy as can be. Growing well, learning well, active, happy. I don't see anything wrong with him whatsoever.

But apparently the MCH nurse thinks he needs to put on more weight. And one of her advice was to cut down on the number of breastfeeding sessions he has throughout the day so that he has more appetite for solids. At the moment, he nurses about 4 to 5 times throughout the day because he has been night-weaned so he does all his nursing during the day. Once before his mid-day nap, once before he goes to sleep for the night, and whenever he requests for his "mum-mum" during the day.

She asked me how would I know that he was wanting to nurse and not wanting some water or food? Do I just assume and give him the breast instead of giving him proper food or water to quench his thirst? Well, I told her that he makes it super clear what he wants because he knows the different sign language for eating food, drinking water, and nursing. They are very clear signs to indicate to me what he wants at the particular time. And ignoring his requests to give him something that he hasn't asked for is like asking for trouble. She was really surprised that he knew sign language and said "oh so he knows the few basic signs?" I said "nope, he has a vocabulary of about 20 or more signs now". Seeing the shock on her face was pretty satisfying ;)

Anyway, she says to try to give him water instead of nursing him next time he asks for it to discourage him from breastfeeding so much. WTH. No freaking way! It makes no sense to me whatsoever! If he needs to gain weight, how is water supposed to help?!?! At least my breastmilk has got good calories and vitamins and minerals along with the water he needs to quench his thirst. How is that inferior to plain water? Not to mention all the wonderful antibodies he gets from me to support his immune system as well.

She mentioned trying toddler formula. Again, WTH?!?! I have (more than) an ample supply of milk that is gushing out of my boobs for FREE and you want me to spend $40 a pop on cans of toddler formula? Really? How stupid is that?

She thinks he may not be getting enough iron from my breastmilk so toddler formula would help. Well, excuse you for your lack of knowledge, but at least 50% of iron in breastmilk is bioavailable and easily absorbed by my baby's guts. In comparison, only 7% of the iron in fortified formula is bioavailable. All the extra iron that the babies cannot absorb in turn causing constipation and build up of excess iron in their little bodies. No thank you. Plus, it's not like he is not eating any solids at all. He eats oatmeal, barley, brown rice, vegetables, etc. All that are excellent sources of iron as well, to nicely supplement what he gets from me.

She suggested that in order to "fatten him up", we should give him lots of dairy products. Whole milk, cheese, yogurt, butter. Stuff like that. Oh my goodness. Don't even get me started on this topic of the misinformation the public receives about the consumption of dairy products. A little bit of research into both academic and non-academic sources and studies will clearly tell you that there are ABSOLUTELY NO benefits in consuming dairy products as part of our regular diets. In fact, consumption of dairy products has been linked to increase risks of cancer and other chronic diseases that plague our human population nowadays. Unless you have access to raw, organic cow's milk that you can be sure has no traces of additional hormones and antibiotics in it, you are subjecting your bodies to all that nonsense, which in turn messes with your endocrine system, affecting your reproductive system, amongst other things. I have absolutely no interest in making dairy a regular part of my baby's diet for all those reasons and more. Oh yes, he eats cheese and yoghurt. But only maybe once a week. (And I cannot for the life of me quit ice cream or chocolates :( )And he most definitely does not drink cow's milk. His mama is right here with the perfect human milk for a human baby. He doesn't need a cow to feed him. Every single time that we experimented with feeding him more dairy that usual, like yoghurt and cheese on consecutive days, or a tiny teaspoon of milk, he suffers. Whether it be constipation, diarrhoea, rashes, pimples, or a wicked cold with super duper crazy amounts of mucus.

Xander is, at the current moment, not a meat-eater. He just does not like to eat meat. I believe it is because he does not have any of his molars yet and chunks of meat pose a choking risk to him, so he chooses to avoid it. Once in a while, he would eat really soft pieces of roast chicken that I cook. Mince always seems to give him trouble with the chewing and swallowing too. He eats fish, so that's fine. Whatever it is, I am not concerned. He will eat it when he is well and truly ready. I like to trust that our babies have an inner instinct to accept what's good for them, and reject what is not. I do my part in making sure that he gets plenty of the necessary proteins and iron from other sources so that he is not missing out. He eats plenty of quinoa, which is one of nature's super foods and has the most complete profile of natural, plant-based protein. Oh and he gets plenty of protein from my milk too.

All that to say that I am super pissed and very upset that a "healthcare professional" whom people look to for information and important advice would give out misinformed information like that. I know better and am able to discern for myself what information is valid and what are simply urban myths. But how many other moms out there have access to such information? Many just take the information at face value and trust that they are the ones who knows best. And that is downright dangerous.

The World Health Organisation has provided very clear guidelines and recommendation, that wherever possible, it is best for children to be breastfed to at least the age of 2 and beyond. Without the interference of modern society, our human species' natural weaning age is anywhere between the ages of 5 and 7. Recommending that a mother weans her child without any clear indication that the child was absolutely not thriving is wrong. It is something that should be encouraged for as long as the mother-child unit is willing to continue. Now, don't get me wrong. I totally see that some moms cannot breastfeed their children, either at all or only for a short time, for whatever reason - work, family issues, health issues, personal preference, etc. It is totally different to choose not to breastfeed, to not be able to breastfeed, or to be told not to breastfeed.

As you can see, I'm annoyed. I don't usually write posts like this. Bottom line is this: My child is healthy and happy and thriving. What we are doing works. Please don't give me advice that is so obviously misguided and misinformed. It annoys my scholarly mind.