OK. So you know I'm a science nut, right? Just thought I'd see what y'all thought :)

Ever since I saw my mom bf, I knew I would. When I moved to Seattle for graduate school though, it was just common place to be immersed in environmental issues. At the time, alot of this was in the news:

PCB concentration increases with age in male killer whales and in sexually immature females. On the other hand, reproductively active female killer whales showed lower PCB levels than did adult males or sexually immature females. A mother killer whale transfers PCBs to her calf as the calf develops and also through fat-rich milk as the calf nurses.

These cool animals have been studied ALOT. Now, there are many scientific studies that I fault....the studies on these animals though are truly telling of apex mammals and are pretty scientifically sound. They can be indicitive of what is happening to us. Its funny, b/c I'm not much of an environmentalist anymore...except for this one issue. Darn, and I hate marine mammals b/c of their "fuzzy animal" nature! Dolphins and rainbows, oh my!

Ever since then (2001), I questioned breastfeeding but still always knew I'd do it. However, with the way my first son is (normal, but definite autistic or ADHD tendencies), I can't help but think that I passed ALOT of chemical his way not only through gestation, but through lactation too. It sounds horrible, but it is just human survival....if there is a way for a body to offload something that can make them sick....it will. Not only did I pass my chemicals down to my son (which btw you pass most of it off to your firstborn), but then I went and shot him up with lots of vaxes his first year of life. Sheesh, momma! Shoulda known better....

I hope you aren't lost at this point. You see in these same studies, MALES are the most vulnerable. In a first time mother, she has a buildup of chemicals in her body. She passes them onto her offspring through gestation and lactation. If she gives birth to a female, then that female has the chance to offload those chemicals to the next generation...If she gives birth to a male, well then...they have nowhere to go. So who do you think has the shortest life span amongst killer whales??? First-born males who were also born after 1970. Alot of them die from immune disorders.....Hmmmm....

Anyway, I hope you are getting my drift. I am just so upset that I could be part of the reason for his chemical overload. I know I can't always blame myself....but it sure gets my goat. And don't hate me for this, but if this "theory" were to ever be true....it would be the end to breastfeeding as we know it. Formula companies would have a field day with this stuff and tout it as "way healthier than breastmilk b/c we can take the chemicals out of it" argh.

Let me know what ya think....

I don't have time to write more now, but here's a really interesting article about this...

http://www.nrdc.org/b...

That was a comforting article! So I guess the real problem isn't breastmilk...its the chemicals stored in our bodies which get transferred to the fetus as it grows :( At least that is the case with PCBs.... Do you know if they have done any research on other chemicals?

Is it true that you can cleanse your body? Some of the drinks out there seem bogus, even though patches on the feet seem funny...and it doesn't get rid of mercury in our bodies.

I was thinking about bringing Regan to a physician in Baton Rouge that specializes in ASD, not sure yet. I hear she focuses on not prescribing drugs, but other therapeutic exercises and diet, etc. I hear she tests the metals, etc. in their bodies...but not sure if she knows of a way to get chems out of the body? I know diet helps...but I have seen people who are vegan and organic and they still have high amts of chems in their bodies :(

J

We met an environmental biologist while traveling, who said he had studied a group of whales off the coast of Africa for similar reasons. He said they had noticed a reproductive pattern in the mother whales of miscarriage, live birth, miscarriage, live birth and on and on.

They then theorized that the mother whales were so contaminated that it took a miscarried fetus for them to be able to have a live birth - the miscarriages allowed them to purge toxins before getting pregnant again and carrying to term. They did not draw any conclusions or connections to humans (that was not the point of his research, I am pretty sure he was the "Save the Whales, Screw the People" type), but I thought it was super interesting. It sure made me wonder about my own miscarriage.

But PS - I have never second guessed breastfeeding for the above mentioned reasons. Everything I have read and all my intuition tells me that the benefits FAR outweigh the risks.

Jenny, you should read the book "Slow Death by Rubber Duck" -- a funny name, but it's really an eye-opener. I've always been kind of a dirty hippie when it comes to avoiding chemicals, but I just happened to read that book while I was pregnant, and I became even more militant.

However, I'd venture to guess that even the biggest Coca-Cola-swilling, Doritos-chomping, mask-free-spray-painting, Pantene-Pro-V-hair-washing, salon-pedicure-getting, Clorox-bleach-floor-scrubbing, Miracle-gro-spraying, Marlboro-smoking Mama's breast milk is still lower in chemicals than most commercial formulas. Even the organic ones have weird ingredients.

I read somewhere a long time ago that in the 80s (I think) women's breast milk had very high concentrations of DDT. I think that my breasts and entire body for that matter holds fewer chemicals to be leaked into my breastmilk than formula carries. So, I just try to reduce my exposure and reduce my children's.

On another chemical/toxicity note: A few years ago there was a study done in China (I believe) that examined non-obese women with PCOS (polycystic ovaries) a condition normally associated with obesity. These women were found to have higher levels of BPA in their blood than non-obese women without PCOS. For whatever reason these women have a genetically prone to storing BPA more than others and the chemical acts as a hormone, altering the woman's response to insulin and resulting in the women producing less estrogen and throwing the estrogen/testosterone balance creating a cascade to PCOS (I hope I'm remembering this all right). As a non-obese PCOS-er I found this to be of great interest. I remember the commercials when peanut butter first came in plastic, all the pro-plastic commercials that ran on tv, plastic bags, the huge wave of tupperware and on and on. Plastic surrounded everything!!!