Have we all been assimilated into using Follow On Milk

Rabidlamb

There's no escape, the guilt is overwhelming, radio ads, TV ads, I'm going to start drinking it myself just to be safe.

Luckily Cow & Gate, Aptimal & SMA are offering this life changing product for the giveaway price of just over €10 a tin.
http://www.tesco.ie/groceries/product/search/default.aspx?notepad=follow%20on%20milk%20powder
My only worry is that they develop a follow on follow on milk when it's time for the young ones to move up again.
To think our generation only had ordinary natural milk from a cow, we are lucky to be here at all.

Now that's sorted I'm off to get me one of those automatic soap dispensers, the times we live in eh.

Hannibal Smith

Rabidlamb wrote: »

There's no escape, the guilt is overwhelming, radio ads, TV ads, I'm going to start drinking it myself just to be safe.

Luckily Cow & Gate, Aptimal & SMA are offering this life changing product for the giveaway price of just over €10 a tin.
http://www.tesco.ie/groceries/product/search/default.aspx?notepad=follow%20on%20milk%20powder
My only worry is that they develop a follow on follow on milk when it's time for the young ones to move up again.
To think our generation only had ordinary natural milk from a cow, we are lucky to be here at all.

Now that's sorted I'm off to get me one of those automatic soap dispensers, the times we live in eh.

lol..I'm drinking it right now!

I never bought it...just swapped to cow's milk when the time came...but you're right they're really going full metal jacket with the ads

Ms2011

I'm dying for my little fella to turn one so I can stop making up bottles, it'll be cows milk for us from then on :-)

foodaholic

Ms2011 wrote: »

I'm dying for my little fella to turn one so I can stop making up bottles, it'll be cows milk for us from then on :-)

Same here.

implausible

That bloody scare-mongering ad about the amount of iron needed drives me nuts - they only need that much IF THEY ARE NOT EATING ANY FOOD!!!! Even if you drank that amount, your body wouldn't absorb it all. I don't know how they get away with it grrr :mad:

liliq

Yep, a lot of it is total gimmick to get around the laws preventing advertising of first artificial milks. Totally unnecessary in most cases. :rolleyes:

Chucken

My daughter just had her 1st baby. She went off today and paid nearly 10euro for a bottle of drops to up the babies calcium. She was told in the hospital to get them! I thought they got all the nutrients they need from breast/formula??

Moonbeam

Chucken wrote: »

My daughter just had her 1st baby. She went off today and paid nearly 10euro for a bottle of drops to up the babies calcium. She was told in the hospital to get them! I thought they got all the nutrients they need from breast/formula??

Vitamin D drops maybe ?

pushkii

apparently we don't get enough vit d in this country as babies because of lack of exposure to sunlight :O
i really think the govt should provide these drops free of charge and put as much effort into advertising the need to give these drops regularly as they do into advertising follow on milk. no wonder the breastfeeding rates in Ireland are so low

liliq

Moonbeam wrote: »

Vitamin D drops maybe ?

That's what I thought...?

Chucken

Moonbeam wrote: »

Vitamin D drops maybe ?

pushkii wrote: »

apparently we don't get enough vit d in this country as babies because of lack of exposure to sunlight :O
i really think the govt should provide these drops free of charge and put as much effort into advertising the need to give these drops regularly as they do into advertising follow on milk. no wonder the breastfeeding rates in Ireland are so low

Ah..that makes sense then I was wondering was it something she didnt need to get. Thats ok now.

Hmmmm..must get baby a passport and jet him off to Greece

shedweller

Follow on milk me arse! My wife insisted on breastfeeding our three kids. It worked very well for the first lad and he had little or no formula. Then he went onto normal enough food mashed up etc. We had twins after that and she kept up the breastfeeding for a good while there too.

One thing that sticks with me though, is how pushy the staff were in the hospital with regards to formula. If they saw the slightest problem with the feeding they would shove the formula in our faces. One of the twins was a bit sick to start with and as a result spent a few days in NICU. Well, what they didn't shove down his throat! They said he was under weight (despite being heavier than his sibling AND not taking into account that he was a breastfed baby so he was going to be lighter. They don't tell you that they refer to a formula fed chart and not a breastfed chart for weights!) and fed him till he was full and then fed him some more. I was apalled at this but they insisted on stuffing him silly. Now, six years later, he has a thing about stuffing his face! Connected? Hmm..
Anyway, back at home my wife, suffice to say, was being sucked dry with the twins and....got sore, shall we say. So she had to take a break to recover. Enter formula.
When she recovered she found she had stopped making milk and no matter how hard she tried she couldn't get it flowing again.
The formula stayed and we found out that the once sick twin couldn't handle regular formula so there was this soy stuff which worked. But boy was i broke buying this crap. As soon as they were old enough i got them off formula. Man that rubbish annoys me.
Sorry, that was a bit rantish. Merry Christmas to all!:)

iguana

implausible wrote: »

That bloody scare-mongering ad about the amount of iron needed drives me nuts - they only need that much IF THEY ARE NOT EATING ANY FOOD!!!! Even if you drank that amount, your body wouldn't absorb it all. I don't know how they get away with it grrr :mad:

I love* how on that ad in very teeny, tiny writing it says something like 'milk is not typically a good source of iron.' Um, no **** sherlock.



*I don't love it at all actually, it makes my blood boil.:mad:

Hannibal Smith

pushkii wrote: »

apparently we don't get enough vit d in this country as babies because of lack of exposure to sunlight :O
i really think the govt should provide these drops free of charge and put as much effort into advertising the need to give these drops regularly as they do into advertising follow on milk. no wonder the breastfeeding rates in Ireland are so low

to hell with the drops...I think they should supply us with a 6 week sun holiday :P all in the kid's best interests of course

Ms2011

shedweller wrote: »

One of the twins was a bit sick to start with and as a result spent a few days in NICU. Well, what they didn't shove down his throat! They said he was under weight (despite being heavier than his sibling AND not taking into account that he was a breastfed baby so he was going to be lighter. They don't tell you that they refer to a formula fed chart and not a breastfed chart for weights!) and fed him till he was full and then fed him some more. I was apalled at this but they insisted on stuffing him silly.

This was exactly my experience as well (except my son was a healthy 8lb weight). I latched him on soon after he was born but he had an infection so he was taken to NICU where he was intencively fed 2 oz of formula every 3 hours regardless of whether he was hungry or not, one time I couldn't get the second oz into him so a nurse forced it in only for him to vomit both ozs back up, I got so upset seeing this :-(
Anyway by the time my milk came in my son had been so stuffed with formula he had no interest in the breast. My biggest regret is not questioning things more & fighting my corner more but as a first time mum & emotionally & physically exhausted after a failed induction & subsequent emergancy c-section I didn't have to where-will-all to do this & just kinda got washed along with things :-(

And not that's my rant over ;-)

How Strange

I always thought the vit d thing was a bit of a swizz but I looked into it and Irish people and those from northern Europe don't get enough vit d during the winter months. It can lead to problens with osteoporosis and even depression. Think about how depressed people can get during the long winter months and it kind of makes sense.

I got the drops half price in a local pharmacy and when I remember I put them in my sons morning cup of milk. I don't stress about it. We shop in aldi and lidl and they don't sell the full fat super milk and I really don't want to add another supermarket into my weekly shopping which I hate doing as it is.

I wouldn't bother with drops from April to end October though.

As for follow-on milk yes it's a gimmick. A very clever one which tries to guilt parents into thinking the HAVE to give it to their toddlers. Strangely enough it doesn't exist in countries where the pharma companies can advertise formula for 0-6 month babies.

Hannibal Smith

Ms2011 wrote: »

This was exactly my experience as well (except my son was a healthy 8lb weight). I latched him on soon after he was born but he had an infection so he was taken to NICU where he was intencively fed 2 oz of formula every 3 hours regardless of whether he was hungry or not, one time I couldn't get the second oz into him so a nurse forced it in only for him to vomit both ozs back up, I got so upset seeing this :-(
Anyway by the time my milk came in my son had been so stuffed with formula he had no interest in the breast. My biggest regret is not questioning things more & fighting my corner more but as a first time mum & emotionally & physically exhausted after a failed induction & subsequent emergancy c-section I didn't have to where-will-all to do this & just kinda got washed along with things :-(

And not that's my rant over ;-)

after my second son was born, by emergency c section too...I felt so rotten...on my first baby they gave you a drip with morphine in it...but in two short years they'd stopped that and instead they pumped you full of morphine...which means you're vomitting for the day and evening after. so my son, who was a great feeder, was fed formula...which was okay by me...I was too ill to form a thought on it lol.

by day 3 my milk had come in and I was feeling much less precious and everyone was breastfeeding around me...so I thought you know what I'll give it a whack. so I asked the midwife and she said it was too late to start....I should have stuck to my guns and just gone ahead because he was such a great eater I'd say get would have been brilliant at it and it would have been so
handy....but sure whats done is done...he's a year now and as healthy as an ox so it did him no harm.

pwurple

Yes, the follow-on milk is junk junk annoying junk. I must look up sales figures for it, I would love to know if people are falling for it. I really had to bite my tongue when I saw a girl i know who breastfed her baby up to 12 months wean onto follow-on milk. To my mind it was a complete change of stance...

They live in the back of beyonds though, so maybe getting fresh milk is tricky? I can only guess that having a stash of powdered milk is handy when you are a 30 minute drive to the nearest open shop. I remember when we dropped the formula, being vaguely annoyed at having to remember to keep milk in the house constantly, as we both work full time, eat at work, so there was never enough being consumed at home to justify buying it during the week.

On the vitamin drops, vit d has dropped right off even in summer with us all being so covered up to protect us from skin cancer. Those drops though, why in the name of goodness are they so strongly flavoured? I wonder what vitamin D actually tastes like, because the horrible aniseed they are masking it with makes me gag.

ariana`

Rabidlamb wrote: »

There's no escape, the guilt is overwhelming, radio ads, TV ads, I'm going to start drinking it myself just to be safe.

Luckily Cow & Gate, Aptimal & SMA are offering this life changing product for the giveaway price of just over €10 a tin.
http://www.tesco.ie/groceries/product/search/default.aspx?notepad=follow%20on%20milk%20powder
My only worry is that they develop a follow on follow on milk when it's time for the young ones to move up again.
To think our generation only had ordinary natural milk from a cow, we are lucky to be here at all.

Now that's sorted I'm off to get me one of those automatic soap dispensers, the times we live in eh.

Bad mammy here, never gave it to my 3 yr old:-) he's so smart, healthy, gorgeous, perfect already though, lol imagine if I had given it to him!?!

Rabidlamb

ariana` wrote: »

Bad mammy here, never gave it to my 3 yr old:-) he's so smart, healthy, gorgeous, perfect already though, lol imagine if I had given it to him!?!

He'd have cured cancer & solved Einsteins Theory of Everything by now if you'd only given him formula.
I feel your shame.

movingsucks

I started giving my baby follow on milk at around six months. Don't intend to keep giving it to her after one though.

Moonbeam

haha
Neither of mine could take milk at 12 months so left them on formula until 18 months but the only reason was that it was better then them being sick.
It appears my 22 year old is now able for very small amount of dairy though \o/ Nutramigen works out expensive!

Nanazolie

Soon the crap they sell in France will hit our shelves... Follow up milk for bigger kids (it's called milk for school years or something like that), baby yogurts made with formula, then milk that is so enriched it only looks like milk. There is even one call "easy digest" and one for the elderly. :rolleyes:

Rabidlamb

Nanazolie wrote: »

Soon the crap they sell in France will hit our shelves... Follow up milk for bigger kids (it's called milk for school years or something like that), baby yogurts made with formula, then milk that is so enriched it only looks like milk. There is even one call "easy digest" and one for the elderly. :rolleyes:

iguana

On the vitamin d issue, in the UK I was advised to just take the supplement myself and Sam should get it through my milk.

lounakin

Some experts do say that the growing up milk is better than cow's milk. Cow's milk is possibly the least adapted animal milk to humans, so it's not hard to imagine that there would be a controversy.... not that I'm leaning one way or another. A lot of people have problems with cow milk. When my daughter grows up I will try and give her goat's milk instead, at least for a couple of years. The trick is to find a brand that doesn't load the milk up with extra crap nobody needs.
Talking about vit D, I got some for my daughter but I found the taste vile and saw that it had added sugar and a bunch of other stuff, additives, flavourings... Instead I got a small bottle from Boots, it has nothing but vit D, it's tiny, 6 months supply, only two drops a day.

0ctober

I was actually about to start a thread on this! God those ads wreck my head, they should be banned. How they've got away with it so long I don't know. It's sickening to think that follow on milk is thought to be the norm now. As for the whole spin they have about the iron, baby should be able to get all their iron needs from an adequate weaning diet.

Also as an aside, I've noticed another very sneaky form of advertising. I'm breastfeeding my daughter, but when I was pregnant I signed up for emails from a certain formula company about my baby's development week to week. After she was born I continued to receive emails promoting their product. They also had info about breastfeeding as they have to be seen to be promoting it. However any time I clicked on the link in the email for an article on breastfeeding it brought me straight to an advertisement for the formula. Conveniently enough if I did the same for an article on bottle feeding it would bring me to the article. Gaaaahhh sneaky advertising makes me so angry!!! >:-(

ceadaoin.

Nanazolie wrote: »

Soon the crap they sell in France will hit our shelves... Follow up milk for bigger kids (it's called milk for school years or something like that), baby yogurts made with formula, then milk that is so enriched it only looks like milk. There is even one call "easy digest" and one for the elderly. :rolleyes:

Do they not already sell that here as 'growing up milk'? It's advertised as the next stage after the follow on stuff.

My daughter drinks follow on milk now but she has just turned one so once the box I have now is finished, it's onto the cows milk

0ctober

pwurple wrote: »

On the vitamin drops, vit d has dropped right off even in summer with us all being so covered up to protect us from skin cancer. Those drops though, why in the name of goodness are they so strongly flavoured? I wonder what vitamin D actually tastes like, because the horrible aniseed they are masking it with makes me gag.

The BabyVitD3 brand of drops are good, they have no taste, no flavourings, sugar, additives etc. And you only need to give 2 drops rather than 5 like some other brands

Nanazolie

ceadaoin. wrote: »

Do they not already sell that here as 'growing up milk'? It's advertised as the next stage after the follow on stuff.

My daughter drinks follow on milk now but she has just turned one so once the box I have now is finished, it's onto the cows milk

Ah. We are doomed...

I started my daughter on formula when she was 6 months, she couldn't digest it so had to spend a small fortune in soya and goat formulas. When she reached one I ditched the powder and bought her goat milk cartons (tastes vile but she liked it). For number 2, I didn't make that mistake seeing he was already a very pucky baby, I kept on breastfeeding until he was old enough to drink cow's milk from a carton. I don't even buy the fortified one, they have a very varied diet so the only supplements I give them is Vit D (my brother had rickets as a child caused by vit D deficiency) and omega 3 because they don't get fish often enough

How Strange

lounakin formula is cows milk which heavily modified and processed. For that reason I started giving my son a little cows milk at 11 months.

If a 7-12 month old baby is on a reasonably broad diet they don't need follow on milk. If they're not then continue them on formula but the follow on stuff has nothing extra despite what the ads may have you believe.

If you think vit d drops taste awful then drink some formula :S

wmpdd3

Ever tasted Aptamil 1yr plus it = dream topping

Moonbeam

Nutramigen one is the worst smelling formula ever,it is terrible but we were happy to have it:)
Soy formula is not recommended for a lot of reasons kids that are allergic to milk are often allergic to goats milk too.
I may have to breast feed this child for a long time!!

Hobbitfeet

My lo is 11 months still breastfed all he drinks is bm and water. Just wondering why people feel like they need either formula or milk (cows,goats etc) when baby is 1 and above? If you babe has a good varied diet then why is water not enough for fluid? Why do we feel like they need milk of some sort?

lounakin

How Strange wrote: »

lounakin formula is cows milk which heavily modified and processed. For that reason I started giving my son a little cows milk at 11 months.

If a 7-12 month old baby is on a reasonably broad diet they don't need follow on milk. If they're not then continue them on formula but the follow on stuff has nothing extra despite what the ads may have you believe.

If you think vit d drops taste awful then drink some formula :S

I know, and I'm not advocating formula at all, just saying that some paediatricians will tell you that formula is basically modified to suit human babies blablabla... Obviously many people use formula instead of cows milk so it must be slightly more adapted or thought to be so.

One of my friends from France gave her daughter that kind of milk because their doctor said it was... wait for it... BETTER than breastmilk.

Never tried formula... why, is it really awful tasting? Yeah the first vit D drops I got were aniseed flavoured and are supposed to be mixed with formula (I didn't read that part) but since my baby doesn't drink formula I just put the drops in her food... the entire portion tasted only of aniseed!

movingsucks

Hobbitfeet wrote: »

If you babe has a good varied diet then why is water not enough for fluid? Why do we feel like they need milk of some sort?

I thought it was to do with calcium for growing bones but maybe all those ads with dancing skeletons as a child were lying to me. My understanding is drinking milk is a good way to get a lot of calcium into a child.
But then I never drank milk as a kid. Frigging hated the stuff. Coke all the way

pwurple

movingsucks wrote: »

I thought it was to do with calcium for growing bones but maybe all those ads with dancing skeletons as a child were lying to me. My understanding is drinking milk is a good way to get a lot of calcium into a child.
But then I never drank milk as a kid. Frigging hated the stuff. Coke all the way

Yeah, calcium, vit d, vit a, phosphorus, protein, fats, carbs. It's a decent enough multi-purpose food/drink combo. We like water too, but she loves her milk and dairy in general. First word was Cheese. Yoghurt or cheese is the preferred treat when given a choice.

I take her off it if for a few days a year when she has a cough or sniffle, just as I think the dairy stuff can make the stuffed-up feeling a bit worse.

I do often think the marketing for dairy products, must be some of the most intensive of any product. The yoghurt aisle in supermarkets is ridiculous. How have they all managed to differentiate themselves? We started to make our own at home and add mushy fruit when she started eating it (very The Good Life, I know, slightly morto admitting it) but there is nothing to it. it sits there and cultures, and then we add fruit. how are there so many yoghurt brands? Double sided aisle of yoghurts in my local supermarket, pure marketing magic that they can all survive. Cheese is the same. I am a cheeseaholic, never met a cheese I didn't like. But my god, there must be 30 different ways to buy just cheddar in the shops. PreSliced, grated, blocks, red, white, 4 different sized packs of each etc. It's all the same product!

The "follow on milk" must be another off-shoot of the same marketing thought. Let's sell the same thing, but make it be in slightly different packaging to hit a different demographic.

Hobbitfeet

I guess I just don't get the thing people have with their child needing some sort of milk. I go from my own experiences I seeing my younger brother breastfeed till he was over 3 and then just been given water as a drink. I also worked as nanny for 2 boys in Norway, 1 was still being bf morning and evening at 13 months he ha water during day with me. The other boy was 16 months had stopped bf and had water was drink they were never given any kind of milk or formula. They had good diets and I guess that was enough for them.
My lo has tough yet and cheese but no milk and probably won't I just think we don't need it. I'm not sure but I heard somewhere that the calcium and iron in milk is the hardest for our body to absorb and that dairy actually blocks the absorption of iron from our food?

How Strange

I agree with you hobbitfeet. My son probably gets a max of 50 ml of milk per day. He gets a yoghurt maybe every 2nd day but I never really bought into the fixation with cows milk/follow on formula/dairy based foods in general as being an essential food group for toddlers.

He gets some but in moderation just like wheat products and red meat.

NIMAN

I'd never buy follow-on milk, crazy. Plus formula milk always tasted very sweet to me, I'm guessing follow-on would be the same. Any benefit probably negated by the amount of sugar in them.

Mine were straight on to cows milk around their 1st birthday, never done them any harm.

Wouldn't buy Vitamin D either, they have very varied diets with plenty of fruit and veg, so I would hope they would get all they need from that.

Advertisers are only preying on new parents with these adverts, making you feel like you are neglecting your child if you don't buy them. A child shouldn't be on follow-on milk up til its 3rd birthday (think I seen Follow-On advertised as suitable up to 3yrs).

implausible

Hobbitfeet wrote: »

I guess I just don't get the thing people have with their child needing some sort of milk.

I think it's a cultural thing. Ireland has always had an abundant supply of high-quality cow's milk, so it's natural that it would be a big part of our diet and indeed many of our parents and grandparents would have been getting it from a far younger age than 6 months! It's also very nutritious. In other parts of the world other foods form a large part of kids' diets.

The yogurt thing drives me nuts too! It is so difficult to find a small tub of full-fat natural yogurt amongst the sea of diet, sugary and other added crap options in the yogurt aisle.

pwurple

It is very hard to get vit d from diet. We produce it from sunlight... We spend a lot more time indoors these days, and covered up when outdoors. That one I don't think is a gimmick.

NIMAN

But should you not get your requirement from your diet? I don't know for sure.

missis aggie

Vitamin D ( its not strictly vitamin in dietery) is produced when body is exposed to sun. Its artificial version is added to food ( like milk, cereals etc).
And I agree that if your diet is well balanced there is no need for cows milk or modified cows milk. Calcium and all the vitamins can be found in plenty of food.

iguana

We drink a lot of cows milk as the odds are we have evolved to. All other mammals and the majority of humans can't process lactose past childhood but about 7-5000 years ago humans in two areas of the planet (eastern Africa and north-west Europe) independently evolved mutations on the second chromosome (probably due to severe shortages of their regular food sources) allowing them to consume the milk of the ancestors of cows that they farmed and gain a lot of sustenance from it. It might seem strange that we drink the milk of another species, especially when in many other parts of the world it's not really done. But the reason for that is that the vast majority of us in this country carry the mutation that makes cows milk highly nutritious to us.

dublinlady

Mine was breastfed for 3 months. Aptamil 1 fir three months then follow on from 6 months to 12. She's ten months now. I plan on giving her cows milk when she's one. For me it's normal to drink milk so ill def give it to her.

Hobbitfeet

implausible wrote: »

I think it's a cultural thing. Ireland has always had an abundant supply of high-quality cow's milk, so it's natural that it would be a big part of our diet and indeed many of our parents and grandparents would have been getting it from a far younger age than 6 months! It's also very nutritious. In other parts of the world other foods form a large part of kids'

Yes it makes sense that it I cultural. I've been trying to do a bit of research about milk since this thread. It seems like the main reason for people giving milk is because its a good source of vit d and calcium..right?? Been looking for other sources of these and I found oily fish which is a much better source than milk. So maybe we should all be eating oily fish instead of drinking milk!! http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8443773/The-best-natural-sources-of-Vitamin-D.html
http://legacy.jyi.org/volumes/volume6/issue3/features/lee_and_wei.html

The main thing that keeps me away from dairy is the amount of hormones it contains and the effects of this on our bodies. It also seems like milk is actually not te best source of the vitamins we are drinking. It's a strange one as we are constantly being told milk/dairy is good for us so what's truth? Sorry if I've taken this a bit off topic

pwurple

There is no "Instead". We eat plenty of oily fish too. Omnivores.

Neyite

iguana wrote: »

On the vitamin d issue, in the UK I was advised to just take the supplement myself and Sam should get it through my milk.

Now why wasnt this suggested over here? It makes so much sense. I never managed to give him the drops because they made him puke, but I'll try to get the flavourless sugarless ones for him and try those instead.

Gee_G

Neyite wrote: »

Now why wasnt this suggested over here? It makes so much sense. I never managed to give him the drops because they made him puke, but I'll try to get the flavourless sugarless ones for him and try those instead.

I took Vitamin D tablets when I was pregnant. It was recommended to me by one of the midwives in the hospital. Started them at the same time as my iron. Not sure if that's the same thing though, was it for both of us or just me, I don't know. I give my little man the Abidec drops and for some reason he loves them! the smell reminds me of something I used to use when I had a toothache!

shedweller

Hobbitfeet wrote: »

Yes it makes sense that it I cultural. I've been trying to do a bit of research about milk since this thread. It seems like the main reason for people giving milk is because its a good source of vit d and calcium..right?? Been looking for other sources of these and I found oily fish which is a much better source than milk. So maybe we should all be eating oily fish instead of drinking milk!! http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8443773/The-best-natural-sources-of-Vitamin-D.html
http://legacy.jyi.org/volumes/volume6/issue3/features/lee_and_wei.html

The main thing that keeps me away from dairy is the amount of hormones it contains and the effects of this on our bodies. It also seems like milk is actually not te best source of the vitamins we are drinking. It's a strange one as we are constantly being told milk/dairy is good for us so what's truth? Sorry if I've taken this a bit off topic

I grew up on "cows milk" and by that i mean it sometimes still had heat from the cow that made it! I remember pouring it on my breakfast and seeing the cream stay on top of the cereal! Feck all hormones on that i tell ya! Ah fond memories. Now my bones are like wolverines they weigh so much. And i dont remember visiting the doctor either. Now, with my kids i'm on a first name basis with the doctor. Owning a cow might be cheaper!