11.16.08
The milk conundrum
Milk. A common household drink in Canada. In fact I know of families that go through a gallon a day (is that really a good thing?). It’s not common in our house anymore.
We’ve been off milk now for quite a while. It’s not an allergy, it’s not even that we don’t like milk, but a bunch of reasons that made us (ok me) choose that milk wasn’t for us.
Dh has had issues with mucous (yeah, I know, TMI). He’s had these issues for quite a while and I’ve noticed he hasn’t complained about being mucousy since well after we stopped drinking the stuff. It’s not perfect, and he’s off the stuff in combination with a saline nasal rinse, but it’s working.
I’ve read too many books on the common treatment of a dairy cow. I say ‘common’ meaning that a good chunk of dairy farmers practice this. Dairy cattle are often in their pens their entire lives, which is shorter than if they would live out of their pens (on average, 18 months). Of course this isn’t every dairy farmer. We actually know an ex-dairy farmer who doesn’t drink milk now for the very reason that he knows exactly how things work. How when being inspected, it wasn’t random and steps were often taken just before the inspector came to ensure a passing of the testing.
Then there’s the fact that the milk is pasteurized. I know there is still the false claim out there of the dangers of raw milk, but they are usually false claims paid for by the dairy industry or the government and have no basis in reality. The reason we started pasteurizing is because kids were getting sick. But no one was looking at what the cattle were eating to create the icky milk. You can’t feed an animal the rotten decay from a Whisky mill and expect it to produce good milk. Plus, no one was using a cow that produces a quality milk (a Jersey, etc), but a high producing cow (the name eludes me) that is more about quantity rather than quality.
My family doesn’t drink it, but every once and I while I question my own decision and wonder if I’m doing the right thing. I hate that, but it happens. And it usually happens after someone has questioned it, or I read some schist on the internet that claims the dangers of raw milk.
So Sweet Pea got his shots on Friday. Getting his shots means I gotta actually talk with a nurse about how he’s doing. He’s growing crazily, but he’s a skinny guy, which means I get the ‘he’s only in the such-and-such percentile’ talk, but it got worse. It seems once the kid falls out of their range of where he should be, they have to notify our dr. Hell I don’t even know our dr’s name we’ve had so many changes of drs. Sweet Pea is in the “under 3% group”, and that’s only when they adjust for his 1 month prematurity.
This has got me wondering if I should load him up on crap homo-milk just to fatten him up. I hate that. Bloody ’should-bes’.
We won’t switch back.
Kristina said,
November 17, 2008 at 12:23 pm
That’s hard. Both of my girls have fallen off the chart at one time or another and I was told that here if they are off the chart for more than 2 visits (1 calendar yr.) CPS has to be informed. Of course, that doesn’t take into account that my girls are PEANUTS and that I am smaller than about 85% of American women. Of course not. I had a doctor telling me to butter everything that girl#1 ate and to add heavy cream to her milk. I refused to do so…who in their right mind would promote such unhealthy things?! You want me to do that so that she acquires a taste for it and then when she’s a heavy adult she’ll have to unlearn bad food habits?! GRRR.
The response I have developed to their concern is the following, “Someone needs to be on the bottom end of the curve to keep the top end up. That why it’s a curve.” Alternatively (which I realize for you wouldn’t work) I tell them, when speaking of Emmie…that I was built exactly the same way. She’ll hit puberty and trust me, she’ll have no problem gaining weight. We eat healthy food-fast food as a rare “treat”–and are developing healthy habits. They weigh what they weigh. Period.
((HUGS))
siuan329 said,
November 17, 2008 at 6:53 pm
My nurse had concerns for my little guy as well. We drink milk but he can’t. He seems not to be growing out of the milk intolerance the other two boys grew out of. Their concern was of course calcuim and fat intake. Is he getting enough of those? My nurse sent me a great email with list for both these things. If you like I can email it to you.
siuan329 said,
November 17, 2008 at 8:06 pm
All the boys here love the rice milk but it’s so expensive this far north. It’s 4 something for a 1L. I usually have to wait until I can get to Whitehosre to get a case or two for $40 each. I have to limit it to only Mica because the other boys can have regular dairy. Mica can’t have a thing, I think his might be an allergy compared to the boys intolerance because they coudl tolerate yogurt adn cheese. Now I’m babbling.