By Sara Russell, Ph.D., FNTP
Many parents-to-be ask me whether dairy consumption is advisable during preconception and pregnancy. Just as with any food, the two main issues to address are the quality and source of the food itself and its compatibility with the individual eating it.
One reason for nutritional deficiencies is an overly restrictive diet. My short answer is that if you tolerate and enjoy high-quality dairy products, go for it! However, if you have complicated, unmanaged health issues, it’s worth working with someone who can help you answer food choice questions from a more individualized perspective.
Is dairy right for me?
Whether dairy is a good food for you and in what amount depends on your complete health profile, including your food intolerances. Some people with asthma, PCOS, allergies, acne, or certain digestive troubles feel better consuming little to no dairy. You may find that certain types of dairy work better for you than others. I have clients who can consume kefir but not milk, aged hard cheeses but not fresh creamy ones, or ghee but not butter. If you feel better when you’re not consuming dairy, you can definitely get the nutrients you need from other sources, and not everyone needs as much calcium as we are often led to believe.
Where do my dairy products come from?
The Cow
The friendly cow all red and white
I love with all my heart:
She gives me cream with all her might,
To eat with apple-tart.
She wanders lowing here and there,
And yet she cannot stray,
All in the pleasant open air,
The pleasant light of day;
And blown by all the winds that pass
And wet with all the showers
She walks among the meadow grass
And eats the meadow flowers.
~ Robert Louis Stevenson, A Child’s Garden of Verses
When Robert Louis Stevenson wrote this celebration of a child’s love for a cow in the late nineteenth century, cows and other milk-producing animals were integral to daily life in many parts of the world. What’s the difference between Stevenson’s “friendly cow all red and white” and the vast majority of today’s cows? In the nineteenth century, cows were raised on pasture rather than confined to massive feedlots. They ate grass and hay, not genetically modified Roundup-Ready corn and soy. They wandered “in the pleasant open air” rather than being crowded together, ankle-deep in their own manure. The conditions of life in the open air and pasture kept cows healthy, in contrast with today’s standard practice of including antibiotics in the daily feed to keep milk production high. To make matters worse, the United States, unlike many other countries, allows for the injection of artificial hormones to produce even more milk, exacerbating the ill effects on the cows, the environment and human health. Interestingly, four companies, none of which actually owns or handles cows, control virtually all the milk processing in the U.S. and keep competition at bay by keeping prices low. In this way, they also control the way farmers produce milk.
Traditionally, milk has been consumed very fresh in its unprocessed state, and any surplus has been transformed into yogurt, kefir, cheese, curds and whey and other dairy products that allow for longer preservation. When I buy fresh milk from the farmer, I typically make yogurt the next day, and my family consumes the yogurt over the course of the next week. The acidic pH of yogurt and kefir prevents the multiplication of unfriendly bacteria.
Types of cows
Organic, grass-fed milk only partially guarantees a wholesome product. In fact, the bulk of today’s cows are Holsteins, selectively bred on the basis of a pituitary gland dysfunction that causes them to produce disproportionate amounts of milk. The excessive milk production leads to recurring mastitis and infection of the teat. Mastitis allows infectious matter into the milk and requires antibiotics. This is one reason why the dairy industry requires the pasteurization of industrially produced milk, and the industry regulates how many white blood cells can be in the milk that is packaged for sale. Moreover, injecting cows with hormones further aggravates this problem, so it is important to look for organic milk (which by law cannot contain either antibiotics or injected hormones) or non-organic milk labeled as free of added antibiotics and hormones.
Infections are not the only result of the Holsteins’ pituitary dysfunction. Over and above regulating milk production, the pituitary gland is the director of the orchestra of the entire endocrine system, sending signals that turn on and off the production of hormones throughout the body. If we are what we eat, dairy products from animals with a disrupted pituitary gland might not be the best choice for men and women in their reproductive years, pregnant women and developing children.
So how can we respond practically to these problems? Every individual and family has to balance the various available options and come up with the best solution. While at home, our family gets grass-fed organic dairy from heirloom cows. However, while traveling, we may be faced with a series of non-ideal choices, such as homogenized and ultra-pasteurized dairy. Your compromise choices may be different from mine, but personally, I would choose Parmigiano Reggiano cheese over organic, ultra-pasteurized, homogenized dairy from heirloom cows. Parmigiano Reggiano is a widely available raw-aged Italian cheese that typically comes from Holsteins. Keep in mind that the injection of hormones is illegal according to the European Union’s standards.
Bottom line: do the best you can
I highly recommend researching the options available where you live and finding the best balance, aiming as high as possible. Unfortunately, the low cost of low-quality dairy has led consumers to perceive high-quality organic, grass-fed dairy from heirloom cows as being an overpriced luxury item. I am confident that the long-term medical and public health costs of low-quality milk are not worth the short-term savings!
In my family, we view the cost of high-quality food as an investment, even in times of financial hardship.
Putting it all together
Generally speaking, clean, fresh and properly handled dairy products from a clean and trusted source is a nutrient-dense food category that provides calcium, protein, vitamin A, riboflavin, potassium, and other important nutrients that support human health at all stages of life, as long as dairy is tolerated. Do the best you can with your sourcing, and don’t stress about what you can’t do.