We will soon be adopting a 6month old baby. Does anyone know of a wholesome home-made alternative to baby formula? We have a Juiceman juicer. Can a baby drink fruit and veggie juice from a juicer????

-- dj murphy (jmurphy1@coin.org), April 27, 2001

Answers

Response to baby formula

Congradulations! At 6 months they can have watered down fruit juice .As far as formuls I would stick to whatever he has been having .Not only is the poor little guy being up rooted from where ever he was , changing foods would be to hard .Also be carefull and go by the book with formula some state offical probally would not like you making one up .I am hoping they will have lots of info for you on what he has been eating , sleep habits , even bowel habits .Children can be over whelming at times . How exciting and scary at the same time .Be sure to keep us all posted when he arrives .

-- Patty {NY State} (fodfarms@slic.com), April 27, 2001.

Response to baby formula

If you don't want to use formula, I would suggest looking into using goat's milk as an alternative. From what I've read and experienced with my youngest child, goat's milk is the next best thing to breast milk.Do a search on the internet for goat's milk for infants and read all you can. You may or may not need to add a vitamin supplement to the goat's milk, so check with your pediatrician or holistic practitioner. Congratulations on the new addition to your family, and enjoy!

-- Kristin, in La. (positivekharma@aol.com), April 27, 2001.

I'm new to this forum but thought you might like to know that you can give a baby goat's milk with carrot juice as a formula sub. I had a friend whose baby was allergic and she did this. At 6 months of age, I don't think you would need to dilute the goats milk at all.

Hope it helps Mrs G

-- Mrs G (gunnar@yifan.net), April 30, 2001.

mrs g. just found this post-a bit late-why carrot juice w/goat milk? just curious.

-- laura (okgoatgal@hotmail.com), March 27, 2002.

I completely sympathize with your desire to do it yourself with this one, but there is a huge difference between human milk (or formula) and goats milk. And many babies have difficulty digesting juice, so it would also be dangerous to rely on that. PLEASE consult a pediatrician for an answer to this question.

Obviously, it would be best for the baby to receive breast milk. It is sometimes possible to breast-feed an adopted child if you are willing to undergo some hormone therapy. Alternatively, the La Leche League (a breastfeeding support organization) might be able to put you in touch with someone in your area who can donate breastmilk to you.

Good luck and bless you for opening your hearts to an adopted child.

-- Anne Sieck (AnneSieck@hotmail.com), April 04, 2002.

There really isn't any substitute for human breast milk. Even the best commercially made formulas are only a second best. Making a homemade formula is a very distant third best and can lead to malnutrition problems.

Fortunately, at six months of age the child is old enough to start eating other foods, soft and pretty bland, but other foods nonetheless. He still needs breast milk or a good formula but he can start having other foods. We stuck with Enfamil the whole way as I don't trust the store brands and won't buy any Nestle baby product.

.......Alan.

-- Alan (athagan@atlantic.net), April 04, 2002.