On Feeding before Teething, Part 2

The Young Mother: Management of Children in Regard to Health
by William A. Alcott

(Page 12 of 37)

4. Sometimes the milk, at first abundant, fails suddenly, owing to some accidental or constitutional defect; and this failure becomes habitual. In all these circumstances, the proper resort is to a sucking bottle, or a hired nurse. I generally prefer the latter. The cases which seem to me to admit of the former, will be pointed out in the next section.

"When the bottle is used," says Dr. Dewees, "much care is requisite to preserve it sweet and free from all impurities, or the remains of the former food, by which the present may be rendered impure or sour; for which purpose a great deal of caution must be observed."

The business of feeding a child, whether by the bottle or the spoon, should never be hurried: the slower it is, the better. We should stop from time to time, during the process. Nor should the nourishment be given while lying down; it is much more pleasant, as well as more safe, to sit up.

A few thoughts more on the character and condition of the milk which we give to the young, will conclude the second division of this section.

Some are fond of boiling milk for infants; but to this I am decidedly opposed, so long as they are in health. Boiling takes away, or appears to take away, some of the best properties of the milk.

It is true that milk which is boiled does not turn sour so readily in hot weather; but it is quite unnecessary to boil milk in the common manner in order to present its changing, since such a result can be prevented by another process. You have only to put your milk in a kettle, cover it closely, and heat it quickly to the boiling point, and then remove and cool it as speedily as possible. This plan prevents the rising to the surface of that coat or pellicle which contains some of the most valuable properties of the milk.

I have already said that it was as necessary that the stomach should have rest as any other muscular organ. Some writers say that the infant should be kept perfectly quiet, at least half an hour, after each meal. This is certainly necessary with feeble children, but I question its necessity in the case of those who are strong and robust. I would not recommend, however, nor even tolerate, for one moment, the absurd practice of jolting, so common with a few ignorant nurses and, mothers, as if they could jolt down the food in the stomach with just as much safety as they can shake down the contents of a farmer's bag of produce. Such mothers as these should go and reside among the native tribes of Indians in Guiana, in South America, where they make it a point not only to stuff their children's stomachs as long as they will hold, but actually to shake it down.

Little less absurd than jolting is the custom of tossing a child high, in quick succession, which is practised not only after meals, but at other times. But on this point, I have treated elsewhere.

Some give the sucking bottle to children as a plaything. This is just about as wise a practice as that of giving them books as playthings. Both are done, usually, to save the time and trouble of those whose office it is to devote their time to the very purpose of managing and educating their offspring. The evil, however, of suffering the child to have the bottle when it pleases is, that he will thus be tasting food so often as to interfere with and disturb the process of digestion, to his great and lasting injury. For in this way, a part of the food will pass from the stomach into the bowels unchanged, or at least but imperfectly digested, where it is liable to become sour, and cause disease. It is not to be doubted that many diarrhoeas, as well as, other bowel affections, are produced in this way. Children that are always eating are seldom healthy; and we may hence see the reason.

In speaking of the importance of keeping the bottle, from which a child takes his food, perfectly clean and sweet, I ought to have extended the injunction much farther. There is a degree of slovenliness sometimes observable in those who manage children, both when they are sick and when they are in health, which even common sense cannot and ought not to tolerate. Every vessel which is used in preparing or administering anything for children, ought, after we have used it, to be immediately and effectually cleansed. How shocking is it to see dirty vessels standing in the nursery from hour to hour, becoming sour or impure! How much more so still, to see food in copper vessels, or in the red earthen ones, glazed with a poisonous oxyd! I speak now more particularly of vessels in which food is given; for with the administration of medicine, and nursing the sick, I do not intend in this volume to interfere.

EXCEPTION 3. - We come now to the consideration of those cases - for such it will not be doubted there are - where a hired nurse is to be preferred to feeding by the hand.

Before proceeding farther, however, it is important to say, that if a nurse could always be procured whose health, and temper, and habits were good, who had no infant of her own, and who would do as well for the infant, in every respect, as his own mother, it would be preferable to have no feeding by the hand at all.

But such nurses are very scarce. Their temper, or habits, or general health, will often be such as no genuine parent would desire, and such as they ought to be sorry to see engrafted, in any degree, on the child. For even admitting what is claimed by some, that the temper of the nurse does not affect the properties of the milk, and thus injure the child both physically and morally, still much injury may and inevitably will result from the influence of her constant presence and example.

Others have infants of their own, in which case either their own child or the adopted one will suffer; and in a majority of cases, it can scarcely be doubted which it will be. And I doubt the morality of requiring a nurse, in these cases, to give up her own child wholly. If one must be fed, why not our own, as well as that of another?

The only cases, then, which seem to me to justify the employment of a nurse, are where she possesses at least the qualifications above mentioned; and as these are rare, not many nurses, of course, would on this principle be employed. But when employed, it is highly desirable that the following rules should be observed:

1: The nurse should suckle the child at both breasts; otherwise he is liable to acquire a degree of crookedness in his form. There is another evil which sometimes results from the too common neglect of this rule, which is, that it endangers the deterioration of the quality of the milk.

2. The milk which is thus substituted for that of the mother, should be as nearly as possible of the same age as the child who is to receive it. It should be remembered, however, that the milk is not so good after the twelfth or thirteenth month, nor quite so good under the third.

3. When the parent or some trusty and confidential friend can, without the aid of interested spies and emissaries, have an eye to the general treatment, and especially to the moral management, it should be done; for even the best nurses may so differ in their principles, manners and habits from the parent, that the latter would deem it preferable to withdraw the child, and resort at once to feeding.