conversation with another mom

[mambera]

So we went out to dinner with another family tonight. They have a formula-fed DD who is a few months younger than my DD. Both their kids are in day care and the baby has been sick both times I have met her.

My DD (who has had only two brief sniffles in her life) was throwing her toys on the dirty floor and I was giving them back to her without washing them. At another point she sat down on the floor as well. (This is a very kid-friendly ethnic restaurant btw; there are always young children running around shrieking and nobody bats an eye. I wouldn't allow this behavior in a more typical US restaurant.)

The other couple felt the stuff above was over their threshold for dirt contact,
so we got in a (friendly) discussion of how much dirt we're comfortable with. I said I felt the Hygiene Hypothesis had a lot of stuff right. I also said I felt day care was the biggie for sick kids. My kid will be starting day care next month so I didn't feel like this came off judgy.

I did *not* say anything about feeding artificial milk, which I think is probably second only to day care as a factor in communicable illnesses among young children. Because I was afraid of sounding judgy or making the other mom feel bad.

Would there have been a reasonable way to word this *without* being judgy or making her feel bad?

[KimberlyD0]

Thats a hard one. See while BF is better for their general health there is no way of knowing that their childs illness is due to FF.

I say this because DD#1 was FF because I wasn't about to BF even though I tried everything I could to BF her. She's as healthy as a horse. she didn't get her first illness untill she was 15-16 months old in daycare. She got sick once and that was it. She started J/K this year and has not missed a day or been sick through the entire year, she even avoided H1N1 when her sister and I had it.

DD#2 is BF. She just turned to and is still BF. She's been hospitalised several times for RSV, Rota virus, UTI, bladder infections, pnamonia, and she's had so many ear infections she had to get tubes. She also was hospitalized when she had H1N1 because she was extreamly dehydrated.

So yes BF has allowed her to be as healty as she could be, but she's still sicker then most babies/children her age.

communicable illnesses themselves have little to do with BF/FF. Just because a child is FF doesn't mean they are at higher risk of getting those illnesses and a BF baby. Its more about the baby themselves. Some just have better immune systems, BF just helps give an extra boost. FF in of itseld doesn't expose the child to any more communicable illnesses then BF does. Both get the same chance of being exposed.

So no I don't think there is a nice non judgemental way of saying that to her, because you don't know the entire situation. You don't know if the baby is exposed to more people, especially children then yours, you don't know if there are under laying medical issues, you don't know if mom and dad are always sick, where they work can also be a factor, if one or both works in a feild where they're regularly exposed to more communicable illnesses, like a hospital or a school. Biggest one for me, is you don't know why they're FF. They might have really tried everything they could reasonable do to BF, she could have some medical issues you don't know about that prevent her from BF.

There is really just to many unknowns.

[Limabean1975]

I agree with Kimberly.

My DD is 12 months old. I kid you not, she has had about 16 colds. It's insane. She weathers them well, but catches every one out there.

She was exclusively breastfed till 6 months, when we started introducing solid food (baby led solids). She still gets the bulk of her nutrition from breastfeeding (always direct from the tap).

Additionally, we are very relaxed about hygiene....she crawls around on the floor many places (not public bathrooms or anything, but lots of places where many people have walked.)

[PatioGardener]

I would have mentioned it, but in a very non-threatening way, something like "and breastfeeding reduces the risk of both respiratory and GI infections, so we've got that working for us too."

As KimberlyDO said above, BF and FF kids have the same chance of being exposed to a communicable illness, but FF kids are more likely to get sick with that illness if it is GI or resp. in nature, at least in the first 6 months of life (we have good studies that show this for the first 6 months.)

I'm big on breastfeeding being normal and formula increasing risk when talking about populations, but I would not use that language with a mom who is currently formula feeding, I'd go with brestfeeding reducing risk.

[Megan73]

Originally Posted by mambera

Would there have been a reasonable way to word this *without* being judgy or making her feel bad?

I don't think so. What's she going to do, relactate? You have no idea why her baby is fed formula or why her kid is sick.
The studies showing formula risks, to my knowledge, show small population-wide differences between BF and FF babies – it's not that you can point to one kid and say she's sick because of formula, something her parents can't really change at this point.

[Carhootel]

Originally Posted by PatioGardener

I would have mentioned it, but in a very non-threatening way, something like "and breastfeeding reduces the risk of both respiratory and GI infections, so we've got that working for us too."

I've said stuff like that before to my SIL, not as a judgement thing but just in conversation about parenting - just facts.

[mambera]

Originally Posted by Megan73

The studies showing formula risks, to my knowledge, show small population-wide differences between BF and FF babies

For sure

– it's not that you can point to one kid and say she's sick because of formula, something her parents can't really change at this point.

I suspect she's sick more because she's in day care (and I expect my kid will get sick once she goes to day care too, because that's how these things go).

Originally Posted by Kimberly

Just because a child is FF doesn't mean they are at higher risk of getting those illnesses and a BF baby.

Well, FF Child A is at higher risk than that same Child A would be if s/he were BF. Obviously you cannot say whether Child A is at higher or lower risk than random other Child B (BF or not) because there are many other factors at play, as you've pointed out.

OK thanks for the input mamas. I will keep on keeping my mouth shut.