Best Breast milk alternatives?

The best thing is baby formula. DON'T suggest straight up cow milk, especially raw - hundreds of thousands of babies died in the last century in this country from drinking raw milk. No matter how clean the dairy is, there will always be germs in raw cow's milk, and babies are not immunologically equipped to handle those germs. Also, straight-up cow's milk (and goat's milk) are not well-digested by babies.

I would suggest organic formula, by Horizon or Nature's One. These are made from better ingredients than regular formulas, but the thing with all formulas (as opposed to just milk) is that they are formulated to have the right proportions of fats, proteins, and carbohydrates, plus vitamins. Are they as good as breastmilk? Never in a million years. But they're not rat poison, either, just a less healthy choice than breastmilk.

See http://www.askdrsears.com/html/0/T000100.asp

http://www.kellymom.com/nutrition/mi...pplements.html

http://www.kellymom.com/nutrition/milk/index.html#other

I know you are asking this question with only the best of intentions, and it must be hard for your friend! But there is a time and a place for formula, and this is one of them.

I will never again give a child of mine regular formula, it is mostly made up of cheap sugar and cheap oil with a little bit of cheap synthetic vitamins tossed in...my dd supplemented on that stuff for her first 3 months and the next day after getting her completely off the forumla she pooped out 3 bowel movements of sticky nasty mucous.

If I could not for some reason breast feed my next baby, I would hopefully be able to do a little research on it first...But, I may use some (even if I couldnt afford organic thats still better than formula IMO) organic/sprouted nut milks, possibly some organic raw milk and maybe some organic formula depending on the ingredients and definitely fresh juices. I know for sure that some fresh juice could never be harder for a babies system to handle than hydrogonated oil and corn syrup!

and thats my $.02...I hope the mama this thread was started about finds the best thing for her and her baby soon

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I agree 100%. Breastmilk is best, but in the situation that it CANNOT be given to the baby, formula would be the next best thing because it has the right amount of fat, nutrients, etc to sustain a baby. If it were me, I would go organic as well.

There was a baby that died last year because the mother didnt want to give her formula so she just gave her rice milk or coconut milk or some other crazy thing and the baby was totally malnourished and died.

Another option might be to see if local moms would donate or something. I know when my baby was younger I had tons of extra milk stored up in the freezer. Now he is alot older so my milk probably doesnt have enough fat to sustain a younger baby but I am sure there are people willing to help so the baby gets SOME breastmilk.