Wet-nursing making a "comeback"

[RachelSerena]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1983285,00.html

[ktbug]

That was a really informative article, actually.

What struck me was the attitude of "a lot of people do it (especially in the UK), but they just don't talk about it". Which is pretty much the attitude I observe in this country about cosleeping.

[Sagesgirl]

Pu Yi, the Last Emperor, was suckled into his teens.

Now, that's extended-nursing.

I think it's a great thing to do for someone you know, or for a baby whose mama is injured, but I don't think I could handle it as a job. I'd become far too attached to the baby.

[siobhang]

Originally Posted by ktbug

That was a really informative article, actually.

What struck me was the attitude of "a lot of people do it (especially in the UK), but they just don't talk about it". Which is pretty much the attitude I observe in this country about cosleeping.

I recently read a book called "from breast to bottle: a social history of wet nursing".

Basically, the historical context is:

1700s - long-term "professional" wetnurses were married (usually working class) women with their own children who would bring the wetnursed child into their own homes and care for them for as long as necessary. Sometimes they lived very close, so the mother would see the baby a lot. Sometimes they lived in the country (considered "healthier" for babies), and mothers would only see them every few months.

There was a lot of casual wetnursing too - where if one mom was watching her sisters' kids, she'd just nurse the baby. Or if a mom was ill or had trouble after birth, her friends might nurse the newborn.

In the south, slaves were regularly used as wetnurses.

1800s (esp victorian age) - sending ones baby away became unthinkable, so the days of using a married woman were over. instead, women were hired to live in the home as primary caregivers to the baby - however, this lead to a huge issue of class/health concerns.

A woman who is willing to live in an employer's house as a wetnurse must have recently had a child, was likely to be very poor, have marginal education, may have been a new immigrant, and was most likely not married. Basicallym the definition of the social outcasts of the time , which resulted in the least desired type of person would live in your house with access to your children, husband, etc and care for your baby.

And there was a strong desire for the wet nurse to NOT bring her own baby - which resulted in high mortality rates (70-80%) for her baby. And unmarried, poor mothers were much more likely to suffer from diseases (TB, STDs, other diseases of poverty) and/or drug/alcohol addiction.

And wetnursing was very expensive proposition - basically another servent in the house - so the only families with wet nurses were the wealthy. And since most of the time wetnurses were only used when the mother had a problem with nursing, the mother felt beholden to the wetnurse for the very survival of her child - something that caused a great deal of anxiety, guilt, and resentment.

Other types of wetnurses were found in foundling hospitals where new (usually unmarried) mothers were allowed to stay if they agreed to nurse a foundling.

1900s - to overcome the above issues, milk banks with pasturized breastmilk were invented as a way to avoid the "contamination" issues (both from disease and from the presence of the wetnurse as a bad moral influence). New moms would donate their milk as part of their contributions towards their medical care after birth.

However, the milk banks were unable to cover their costs, and with the relatively cheap and safe invention of formula and pasturized milk, more and more women preferred formula over wetnursing or milkbank milk (which was increasingly expensive).

Siobhan

[hunnybumm]

Very interesting.

[Sustainer]

Thank you for posting! Excellent article! I love it!

[bri276]

I'd do it in a heartbeat. anyone in RI??? dd could never "nurse" and wetnursing would be a great way to keep up the milk supply for my ep'ing!

[MamaVolpe]

1974

Just a note. My sister was born in 1974 and she had a wet nurse. Her birth mother died shortly after she was born and the hospital that she was born at had a wet nurse on staff who fed her. This was in Korea not US. My parents adopted her with in a few months, shortly before I was born. Isn't it cool that a hospital would have a wet nurse on staff. I guess you wouldn't need all those free samples of formula the hospital gets.