When a baby does not gain weight correctly or is never satisfied, no matter how often the mother is breastfeeding, fear creeps up: Is my milk good quality? Does it lack any nutrients?

We are all used to checking the quality of the food we buy. In fact, advertising emphasizes this and reminds us that it is very important, when selecting a product, to be aware that there are different levels of quality. In addition, each brand reinforces the idea that their product is of the highest quality. After all, we all want to choose the best product, don’t we?

So the question arises whether there are different qualities of breastmilk. You might have even heard of some mothers having breastmilk that looks like butter or that some have thin or watery breastmilk.

Is this true?

No, in fact, this is just yet another breastfeeding myth. Science has shown no breastmilk is of higher quality than others, and no breastmilk lacks something. Nor does the mother’s diet influence the composition of her breastmilk; the differences relating to the mother’s diet are minimal.

So why do people say that some breastmilk is of poor quality?

When a baby does not gain weight correctly or never lets go of the breast, the first thing people tend to think is that there is something wrong with the breastmilk. But in fact, in most occasions, when something is not working correctly, it is most likely that the baby is not latching on well onto the breast, has sucking difficulties, or the mother’s breastfeeding technique is not entirely correct.

In addition, breastmilk looks very different from cow’s milk. We are so used to seeing homogenized cow’s milk we buy in supermarkets, but this has undergone a process that makes it consistent, and it all looks the same. On the other hand, expressed breastmilk looks very different from cow’s milk. If it is left to stand and has not been handled, it develops more or less dense layers, and usually, the densest but smallest layer is the fat layer at the top, while the lower part is apparently very light. This could make you think that your breastmilk is inconsistent, but it is not.

But not all mothers have enough milk…

This is possible; you can find more information about hypogalactia and low milk supply in this article. Because just as it has been proven that the quality of breastmilk is always optimal, it does happen that it is not enough, either because of, as mentioned above, a bad latch or breastfeeding technique or also because the baby has sucking difficulties or the mother does not produce enough milk.

Therefore, we can safely say that a mother’s breastmilk is always the right quality to nourish her baby. And if difficulties come up, it is best to look for the causes as soon as possible and not fall into the myth that it could be the fault of the breastmilk.

Do you have any other questions?

You can find more information about all things breastfeeding in our free app, LactApp, for iPhone or Android. In the contact section of the app, you can find an in-app consultation channel where our experts will answer your questions.