# Would human breast milk be better for me than cow's milk? Can much can a woman make? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 6, 2006, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546 "2006-10-06T20:20:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/1 "2006-10-06T20:20:12Z")
As an adult male are there any benefits to me in drinking human female breast milk vs cows milk? How would breast milk taste on cereal? How much milk (on average) can a healthy, lactating woman produce per day? ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/2 "2006-10-06T20:36:43Z")
You need to read Piers Anthony’s short story “In the Barn”. It’s in the second **Dangerous Visions** anthology, and it’s in an anthology of Anthony’s short stories. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/3 "2006-10-06T20:39:58Z")
I have no idea if breastmilk is more easily digestible or healthier for adults than cow’s milk. It does contain plenty of lactose, so if you’re lactose intolerant, it won’t be nice for you. Breast milk taste varies depending on the time of day, what the mom’s been eating, and whether you’re drinking the first milk to come out or the last. The first milk is very watery, and the hind milk is very fatty. (If your baby is hungry and drinking long enough to get out the satisfying fatty stuff, your body “knows” she’s growing and will need more milk soon, so it makes more milk. If she’s satisfied after only the watery stuff, your body will make less milk. Pretty cool, huh?) Generally, though, breast milk is very sweet - like drinking melted vanilla milkshake. Because the milk changes taste depending on what mom’s eaten lately, there’s some speculation that breastmilk babies tend to be less picky eaters, because they’re used to a variety of tastes, where formula fed babies always taste the same thing. There’s also a theory that one reason breastmilk babies have less allergies is because of the variety of breastmilk - different allergens get through at different time and the baby’s immune system learns to deal with them slowly, rather than going on allergenic overload. Some women have a nearly unending supply of milk, and others don’t make enough even for their own babies. There was one woman in my lactation class who was trying to follow the pumping advice “pump until the flow stops, then two minutes past that” (the idea being that that extra stimulation will tell the body to make more milk next time), and she never got her milk to stop. She pumped 40 ounces at one sitting before the teacher told her to stop! Meanwhile, I was on all sorts of drugs, supplements and pumping schedules and never got more than 12 ounces a day. (Most babies drink up to 25-30 ounces a day at their max before starting solids.) Life ain’t fair. ---
**Author:** ![velvetjones](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/5f9b8f/32.png) [@velvetjones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/velvetjones)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/4 "2006-10-06T20:42:58Z")
What I understand about lactating is that it is a supply and demand thing. A woman’s breasts will produce as much milk as is needed to replace what was removed previously. How much that amounts to in ounces or gallons I do not know. IIRC human milk is sweeter but somewhat thinner than cow’s milk. I haven’t tried it on cereal but I don’t imagine it would be bad. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/5 "2006-10-06T21:01:11Z")
It would be interesting to see if you could develop an above-board market for the stuff. Producing is a hell of an effective weight-loss program–eat all you want, feel great with all the lactating happy-hormones, and watch the weight just melt away. (I’ll leave the "Melt-in-your-mouth jokes for someone else). ---
**Author:** ![gabriela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/db5fbb/32.png) [@gabriela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gabriela)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/6 "2006-10-07T01:24:19Z")
Friend of mine has a four-week-old baby. It’s her third. She says her breasts produce so much milk, so fast, that they choke the poor baby, who has milk spilling over her cheeks and nose when she tries to suckle. Friend also says that if the baby doesn’t wake on the regular two-hour schedule to suckle, her breasts let down milk anyhow, in her sleep, and get the bed wet. Wakes her uncomfortably out of sleep, and totally grosses out her three-year-old if he happens to be napping with her; he’s dealing with potty issues. Friend is an MD, a local medical examiner, and a little bitty split of a thing who doesn’t look like she’s got enough tits to fill an A cup. But it isn’t the size that makes the lactation - isn’t that right, **WhyNot**? ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/7 "2006-10-07T01:39:18Z")
[QUOTE=Inigo Montoya] It would be interesting to see if you could develop an above-board market for the stuff.) [/QUOTE] There’s an organization that ships expressed breast milk to needy mothers overseas. It’s a charity, of course, not a market, but the need is there. To answer the OP, there would be little benefit for anyone who gets a normal healthy balanced diet of solid foods. Breast milk has a number of useful properties for newborns besides nutrition - stimulating the immune system perhaps most importantly. But adults can get all the nutrients out of solid foods, need the fiber they provide, and have developed intestinal systems that normally don’t need prompting. It’s hard to think of even specialized situations in which breast milk would be the best option for an adult. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/8 "2006-10-07T04:04:08Z")
[QUOTE=gabriela] Friend is an MD, a local medical examiner, and a little bitty split of a thing who doesn’t look like she’s got enough tits to fill an A cup. But it isn’t the size that makes the lactation - isn’t that right, **WhyNot**? [/QUOTE] Heh. Tell me about it (says the 38G). Grr. (But I’m glad she has enough. Remind her that it will slow down and production will soon meet demand.) ---
**Author:** ![Chotii](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@Chotii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chotii)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/9 "2006-10-07T07:47:10Z")
There were days, when I was pumping milk for one of my twins, nursing the other, and thrandem-nursing my 2 year old…that I pumped a _known_ 1300-1500ml of milk per day, and I mean measurable. That does not count the amount the two nursing babies took. I may well have been producing a gallon of milk a day at the height of that lactation. I could eat anything I wanted, in those days. And did. When the one baby finally was switched from breastmilk to an enteral g-tube formula (at 21 months of age) and I dumped all the outdated milk in the freezer, I dumped 10 gallons. I sent another 1000 oz over the course of those 2 years, to the Mother’s Milk Bank in Denver CO. I am 4’10". I have never in my life been larger than a 38DD (and that was then). Size of woman or breasts is no indication of how much milk might be produced. On the other hand, I think _most_ women produce nothing like so much, nor would be willing to sit with a hospital-grade pump 8X a day (including nights) to achieve this. I do happen to know, however, that the Mother’s Milk Bank has been known to provide pasteurized human milk to select, extremely medically fragile, adult humans. Mostly it goes to infants who cannot tolerate any of the available formulas, and whose mothers cannot provide milk. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7bcc69/32.png) [@Mighty\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Girl)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/10 "2006-10-07T14:39:20Z")
While \*\*Chotii \*\*here wins the SDMB Moo Award, I also had overproduction when my daughter was a newborn. For the first two months, and because she refused the breast, I pumped and fed her fresh milk and froze the excess. Because I had a problem with collapsed ducts I had so much production that cysts developed in my breasts all the time and had to be drained with a needle. Not so much painful as freeky though. A couple of months after baby decided to take the breast normal production occurred. A few months later I dumped more than two gallons of old milk from the freezer. ---
**Author:** ![SCSimmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e495f1/32.png) [@SCSimmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCSimmons)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/11 "2006-10-07T16:08:08Z")
Evidently, [if you mix it with chocolate syrup, it tastes just like Yoo-Hoo.](http://www.thesneeze.com/mt-archives/cat_steve_dont_eat_it.php) (Scroll down to vol. 5 …) ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/12 "2006-10-07T16:28:34Z")
[QUOTE=Chotii] There were days, when I was pumping milk for one of my twins, nursing the other, and thrandem-nursing my 2 year old…that I pumped a _known_ 1300-1500ml of milk per day, and I mean measurable. That does not count the amount the two nursing babies took. . [/QUOTE] 1500 ml? [That’s a lot of milk!](http://images.washtimes.com/photos/full/20041011-120629-4232.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![thirdname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@thirdname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdname)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/13 "2006-10-07T21:15:01Z")
[QUOTE=Inigo Montoya] It would be interesting to see if you could develop an above-board market for the stuff. [/QUOTE] I don’t think so, not unless you can get the women to live in cages with controlled diets and monitored health. You don’t know what some strange woman is putting in her body or what diseases she might have, so I can’t see the FDA ever letting it happen. Not to mention it’s weird. ---
**Author:** ![Chotii](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@Chotii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chotii)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/14 "2006-10-07T22:21:37Z")
There is a fetish market for breastmilk. Occasionally, someone tries to sell it on Ebay. BUT the FDA apparently considers it a ‘live tissue transplant’ and the sale of breastmilk, except by very specific licensed groups under very strictly-controlled conditions (ie, pasteurized and only by doctor’s prescription), is illegal in the extreme. I have known women who provided breastmilk to the babies of friends or relatives, not under these stringent guidelines, functioning effectively as wetnurses. I’ve known women who were that desperate to have breastmilk for their babies, but who could not produce their own, and could not get it by prescription (no insurance for $2.50/oz milk - and that was the price years ago). In such a situation, you have to just trust the donor mother to be telling the truth that she is eating healthy and has no milk-communicable diseases (though if she’s feeding that same milk to her own baby, one hopes these things are true anyway.) ---
**Author:** ![xiix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/d6d6ee/32.png) [@xiix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xiix)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/15 "2006-10-07T22:37:08Z")
From that Steve, don’t eat it site: Now, while I may have issues with drinking this breastmilk stuff, I have been a huge fan of its packaging for years. You may be interested to know that breast milk is now available in a variety of convenient sizes: from the portable, half-pint container…to the more economical one gallon jugs. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![gabriela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/db5fbb/32.png) [@gabriela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gabriela)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/16 "2006-10-07T22:38:13Z")
[QUOTE=xiix] From that Steve, don’t eat it site: Now, while I may have issues with drinking this breastmilk stuff, I have been a huge fan of its packaging for years. You may be interested to know that breast milk is now available in a variety of convenient sizes: from the portable, half-pint container…to the more economical one gallon jugs. 😛 [/QUOTE] I believe **Whynot** is the object of that descriptor. ---
**Author:** ![Gfactor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9de053/32.png) [@Gfactor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gfactor)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/17 "2006-10-07T22:42:09Z")
[QUOTE=Chotii] I do happen to know, however, that the Mother’s Milk Bank has been known to provide pasteurized human milk to select, extremely medically fragile, adult humans. Mostly it goes to infants who cannot tolerate any of the available formulas, and whose mothers cannot provide milk. [/QUOTE] Right. > [@](#): > > Donor milk has been reported to be effective for nutrition, > postsurgical treatment, and to provide immunological > benefits. Patients with varied conditions including > bowel surgery (omphalocele, gastroschisis), failure to > thrive, formula intolerance, suppressed IgA levels (including > adults treated post liver transplantation), allergies, > chronic renal failure, leukemia, intractable pneumonia, > and HIV have responded positively to the use of > donor milk. [http://jhl.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/19/3/313.pdf](http://jhl.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/19/3/313.pdf) [http://jhl.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/18/4/393.pdf](http://jhl.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/18/4/393.pdf) (lists recipients in order of priority) [http://www.breastfeeding.org/articles/milkbank2.html](http://www.breastfeeding.org/articles/milkbank2.html) [http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/bfm.2006.1.3?cookieSet=1](http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/bfm.2006.1.3?cookieSet=1) ---
**Author:** ![Sonia\_Montdore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/90ced4/32.png) [@Sonia\_Montdore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sonia_Montdore)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/18 "2006-10-07T22:43:52Z")
[QUOTE=astro] As an adult male are there any benefits to me in drinking human female breast milk vs cows milk? Possibly. I’ve read that when John D. Rockefeller was in the last months of his life, he couldn’t swallow solid food so his family hired a wet nurse to suckle him. ---
**Author:** ![naotalbah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7c8e57/32.png) [@naotalbah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naotalbah)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/19 "2006-10-08T02:28:58Z")
[QUOTE=Inigo Montoya] It would be interesting to see if you could develop an above-board market for the stuff. Producing is a hell of an effective weight-loss program–eat all you want, feel great with all the lactating happy-hormones, and watch the weight just melt away. [/QUOTE] Don’t I fricken’ wish.I weigh more now after 2 years of nursing than I did when I got pregnant. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-human-breast-milk-be-better-for-me-than-cows-milk-can-much-can-a-woman-make/375546/20 "2006-10-08T02:38:54Z")
[QUOTE=Sonia Montdore] [QUOTE=astro] As an adult male are there any benefits to me in drinking human female breast milk vs cows milk? Possibly. I’ve read that when John D. Rockefeller was in the last months of his life, he couldn’t swallow solid food so his family hired a wet nurse to suckle him. [/QUOTE] That’s just an urban legend. [http://www.booknotes.org/Transcript/?ProgramID=1418](http://www.booknotes.org/Transcript/?ProgramID=1418) > [@](#): > > LAMB: You know, in the–one of the earlier books we did with Linda Simon on William James, who you mentioned early in your remarks, he fashioned something that William Gladstone had done, chewing food 32 times every time he ate. What is this business of counting the number of times you chew in that time of the world? > > Mr. CHERNOW: Actually, I think that there was kind of an old wives’ tale at the time; that th–that the more you masticated the–the food and soaked it with saliva, that the easier it would be to–to digest. Rockefeller, when he was in his early 50s, after he had created this global oil monopoly, had a kind of breakdown. It was both a physical and a nervous breakdown of sorts, and he had terrible digestive problems. > > It’s very, very interesting because the source of that breakdown, when he was in his early 50s was not, as one might imagine, the stress and strain of creating Standard Oil. It was the strain of his charitable commitments, particularly–he was creating the University of Chicago at the time. So he began a diet of bread and crackers in order to cure these digestive problems. What happened was that there was a whole very pernicious mythology for the rest of his life that he could only survive on mother’s milk. I mean, this was part of this vampirish image of Rockefeller that he was such a ghoulish character that he needed mother’s milk in order to survive.