Cow's Milk for a 9 Month Old?

[clemrose]

We aren't super TF in our house but I'm trying to move us in that direction. My husband is really weary of raw milk (despite my best efforts...a whole other discussion!) so we go for organic whole milk.

My question is this...
I have a 9 mo old who is still nursing but loves food (we give him almost anything we eat and he loves it all) and will take a bottle easily. I'm going to be separated from him tomorrow and have some milk pumped but I'm worried that it isn't enough. My sister will be watching him...I was thinking of having her offer him some organic whole milk if she runs out of breastmilk.

What do you think? And for those of you who do consume dairy a lot, when did you start giving your kids cows milk (raw or otherwise) to drink? I'm going to try to get a copy of Real Baby Food tomorrow, but noticed on Nina Planck's website that she says there is no need to restrict after six months.

Thanks!

[Rainbow2911]

If my pumped milk ran low then my little guy would get some whole cows milk mixed into his bottle when I was away from him. At this age he had already been intoduced to cows milk products like yogurt and cheese and been fine with them. As it was mixed with human milk I was totally fine with him having the odd drink of it.
Hope that helps!

[clemrose]

thanks so much! i think that's what we'll try too. he does eat yogurt and cheese (and loves them). so that does make me feel better too.

[gardenmommy]

Breastmilk (or formula, not going to start a war here!) should obviously be making up most of his diet still. He's a baby. However, it sounds like you are just needing to supplement for the day? And he's already eating solids, including cheese and yogurt, right? I wouldn't worry about it, if that is the case. As long as he is primarily still nursing, I think that the occasional supplement of cow (or goat, or whatever) is just fine.

[Ruthla]

It sounds like the day she was leaving the milk was this past Sunday. What did you end up doing Clemrose?

My advice was going to be that it doesn't much matter whether you leave the baby with cow's milk, goat's milk, raw milk or pasturized milk, or formula. It's only for one day and the baby is getting pumped breastmilk first. You may not even need a supplement at all!

However, if this was a regular thing (WOHM who wasn't able to pump enough on a regular basis) I'd need to know just how much breastmilk the baby was getting at home, how much was being pumped, etc, plus how many solids the baby was getting and what types of solids. I'd lean towards formula if it was a lot of milk and/or the baby wasn't getting many solids yet.

[clemrose]

Thanks for the additional responses! My sister only had to add milk to one bottle and he was fine. I think I was just worried because it was the longest he's been apart from me before.