I have been wanting to talk about the magic of breastfeeding for a while and my recent visit to my son’s check up reminded me it was overdue!
When they measured my baby’s weight for his 6 months check up, his percentile was surprisingly in his 70s when it had always been pretty much off the chart. Note that this high percentile trend runs in the family, and that all my other children were always extremely big babies and full of rolls. 
I was even more surprised to hear that because I had recently started to cut down gluten and carbs, my milk was, still according to my pediatrician, not caloric enough.
I never thought such a thing could happen because I firmly believe in the magic of breastfeeding !!
So as soon as I got home I called my friend Johanna at HelpLatch, who is an amazing and super knowledgeable lactation consultant and all around magical human.
She reassured me that I was not doing anything wrong and that often pediatrician do not use the WHO growth charts. Johanna said:
” Older growth charts don’t account for the difference in growth trajectories for breastfed babies as compared to formula feeding. Patterns for breastfed babies tend to have rapid growth up until around 3 to 4 months, and then their growth rate slows down, which is different than for formula fed babies, whose growth rate continues at the same rate past 4 months. “
She also reminded me that my diet won’t affect its caloric value nor its macro-nutrients. When a baby breastfeeds, the first milk is usually higher in water concentration and after few minutes, milk is full of fat contents. We call the first milk fore-milk and the other hind-milk.
This reminder was very reassuring. After all, I know in my very gut about the magic of breastfeeding!
Did you know that whenever a baby breastfeeds, he sends a back- wash full of useful information to the mammary glands?
Think of it as a mother-ship / satellite relationship. Say baby is not feeling well; when she breastfeeds her spit up back wash contains some of the germs that are making her sick. Once the back wash reaches the mammary glands, they are able to signal the body to create antibodies to fight the pathogens back, which will then travel through the milk and reach baby right away.
Dare tell me our bodies are not healing machines!! More over, women have it really down to an healing art!
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