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Ep. 161- Why is my breastmilk blue? Milk colors and what they mean

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Welcome to the Milk Minute. We are talking about breast milk colors today. But first, no, I’m kidding. But first, this rendition of Somewhere the Rainbow. Welcome back everybody. Breast milk colors are stressful. They are. So we thought we’d talk about it because honestly, 90% of the information I see online about this is stressful.

It’s like, look at this little chart to tell you all the ways the colors of your breast milk might be bad. Yeah. And then it’s like, should I feed my baby? And 50% of the world is like definitely do it. And the other 50% it’s like, don’t do it. Yeah. So, or they, they could die. We are MythBusters today friends, and we are here to spout the fun facts.

Yeah. Rain rainbow style. No, I’m really excited actually, for this one. I’m gonna learn something. I’m gonna teach you all. I love doing that. I’m like genuinely gleeful about this episode. You know what Maureen’s face right now looks this happy because she actually found some research based answers. I did. For once in her godforsaken life.

Yeah. She found some data. Yeah. Thank you to the dairy industry. Yeah. We still need to get them on the show. Woohoo. Yeah. Actually, but first I have kind of a complicated listener question, so we’re gonna have to take a few minutes on that. Is that okay? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So Maddie from Washington State is one of our patrons, and right now she’s dealing with shingles.

Ooh, I’ve had this before. Yeah. With the patient. So she asked, what studies or information do we have about lactating/ chest feeding parents, you know, feeding their kiddos while they have shingles. Do they pass antibodies? Do they transmit it? You know, she’s curious, especially for babies who have not been vaccinated for varicella yet.

You know, she has a 14 month old who’s not fully vaccinated. She’s working with her ped, but she just wanted to see if there’s any like extra breastfeeding wisdom that we can drop on her. Yeah. First of all, that sucks for you. Yeah, I’m sorry. That’s like the last thing you need on the planet right now. Last thing anyone really needs, but the good news is shingles is not passed through breast milk.

Absolutely. So to be very clear, The varicella virus is only passed through direct contact to those little blisters and the liquid inside of them. Mm-hmm. And only for a certain amount of time. Yes. And you can’t, shingles itself is not contagious, however, you can get chickenpox from somebody who has shingles.

Yeah. It’s a whole vibe. It’s a whole thing. Yeah. Right. So just direct contact. It’s not from like, just spending time with them. And you know, the simple way to prevent that if you’re nursing a baby or taking care of young children is to cover your lesions in like dry bandaging. Now the more complicated side of this is if you have lesions on your chest.

And you’re breastfeeding. Yeah. This was my patient. She had it near, but it wasn’t mm-hmm. On the nipple. Right. So we were able to cover it, but it was close. Yeah. And, and so you can make the choice then either to like, you know, be on the more conservative side and do some exclusive pumping so your baby has no chance of touching it, or to be very careful about bandaging.

If a lesion develops on your areola or nipple, we’re still expressing milk, but we’re gonna probably discard that milk. Okay. Because just from that side? Just from that side, yeah. Not the other side. Because we don’t know if any of the like liquid from those blisters is getting into it. Yeah. We don’t want that in their mouth.

And I have to also add, if you’re doing that and like, so those blisters are gonna touch your breastfeeding equipment. You have to be super careful then about that, like contaminating other members of your family. You should probably be the only one doing those dishes. Hmm. That sucks too. It does suck. It really does.

But in general, we’re just gonna make sure you wash your hands. You know, if baby comes into contact with the lesions, like say you didn’t realize you got one on your breast and you were feeding at night. You wake up and you’re like, oh shit. Talk to your doctor. About possibly getting the varicella zoster immune globulin it might be appropriate for them.

And you can take antivirals. Yes, you can take antivirals while you are breastfeeding. There are lots of safe options for you. All right. Good luck out there with your open weeping shingles. I’m so sorry, Maddie. Yeah, we are. It’s really terrible. All right, and we do have some new patrons, so, so many. Thank you guys so much for all of the support.

We’ve been getting a huge outpouring of love. About my new pregnancy and the new podcast Beyond the Boob, which tracks my pregnancy week by week. And Maureen is my midwife who’s taking me through some really good prenatal education. Mm-hmm. That you’re not gonna get anywhere else. So thank you to everyone who has invested in that and invested in this show, which in turn helps you all.

So we really appreciate it. The following patrons are my new favorite people. Mariana Wilson. E. Aden Kraka. Jesse Ritter. Amanda Panda. That’s cute. Kate Austin. Dana Jacobs. Julia Walsh. Thank you guys so much. Honestly, like I think we’re gonna get to the point where beyond the boob funds this entire thing, Which is like, I’m there for it.

Yeah. I’m here for it. We’re going on three years working shrimp. We’re, I will exploit the shit outta this sea. We do. We have to call like the child actors guild for, for an unborn be Oh, I hope not. That’s funny. Yeah. So we really do appreciate it. And we are going on three years, we’re almost at our three year podcast anniversary, which is very hard to believe it.

I, yeah, I think we’re gonna plan something for it. Something big. Don’t know what yet, but I’m gonna make it over the top. It’s gonna be great. It’s gonna be wonderful. Awesome. Well, I think, you know, let’s, like, let’s take just a quick break and then we’ll jump right into the rainbow. Take me through the milk rainbow, Maureen.

I will. Okay.

Imagine a world where you seek lactation care and it’s easy and someone greets you at the door and they’re nice to you and they give you a hot cup of tea and let you sit on the couch and talk about all the issues, not just the breastfeeding issues. What a cozy fantasy Is there anywhere that’s real? Oh, it’s real girl.

It’s real, and I’ve been building it for quite a long time. My business is called breastfeeding for busy moms, and me and every member of my team are trained in our three major tenants, which is accessibility. Kindness and personalization. If you wanna book a consult with Heather or anyone else on her team, you should head over to breastfeeding for busy moms.com.

We do accept some limited insurance and we’d be happy to walk you through it if you wanna give us a call. And that number’s on Google. So go sit on the cozy couch with Heather. At breastfeeding for busy moms. Love you guys.

Someday. I wish upon song. Okay, let me start out by saying that popular explanations for milk color are just kind of bullshit usually. Okay. I’m sure you have read lots of Facebook posts where people are like, look at my green milk, cuz I have covid. Mm-hmm. A lot of it’s just wrong. It’s just wrong. Okay.

Yeah. You know, as, as you know, like we can’t just look at milk and be like, oh, it’s that color. So it means some magical immune properties are in it or something, or it’s unhealthy for baby, or we just make some really wild assumptions, honestly. Yeah. And some of, I feel like we’ve invented to make ourselves feel better.

Yeah. And some of them I feel like we’ve. Used to make others feel worse. They’re mongering. I hate it. I hate it. I, I do too. And I really hate every time I come across a post like that, even like our Facebook group and, and I look at the comments and I’m like, no, no, no, no. And someone’s like, yay, your milk is amazing.

It has extra antibodies. And someone else is like, that milk is spoiled. Throw it away. And you’re like, no, stop. Everybody. Just get off. Get off me. So, Today we are here to reassure you that your milk is fine. Okay? Ah, thanks. It’s gonna change colors. That’s okay. And if you never pumped an ounce of milk, you would never know.

Never, ever, never. Are you ready to ride the rainbow? Well, when you put it that way, absolutely didn’t mean to put it that way. I’m ready to, ready to ride? Let’s go, Maureen. Okay. Well, I’m gonna start with white because white is all the colors. Okay. What, so why is milk white? That’s a great question. I know the answer.

I don’t think I. Do know the answer. Okay? Milk is white because the different fats and protein molecules reflect the entire light spectrum. When you see something white, all of the colors of the light spectrum are being reflected back at you. Oh yeah. So the entire rainbow. Even though milk is mostly water, right, normal, it contains what, two to 5% fat and lots of protein, and those little molecules are evenly dispersed in there.

It is opaque because it’s a suspension, meaning those little molecules are evenly disbursed and they don’t dissolve fully. In the liquid. Ah, okay. Yeah. And so that’s why it reflects white light. And that’s also why when it separates in the fridge mm-hmm. And the water separates from the fat and cholesterol and protein, it looks different.

It looks different. Okay. Yeah. And so freshly expressed milk right is gonna look different. We have a lot of that, you know, that way, that liquid, that everything’s suspended in has all these fat molecules. And if we’re thinking about fat, right? It’s, it’s butter essentially that’s, that’s the fat in your milk.

When it’s cooler, it’s a solid, and it’s opaque when it’s hot. When you heat it up, that’s when it becomes a liquid and it becomes, See through. So we have these cool, solid, tiny little fat molecules floating around there, making it look like your milk is opaque. I love that. Really cool, huh? Very cool. Yeah.

Thanks Dairy industry for teaching me that one. Yeah. Okay. I’ve never thought about it that hard. Yeah. Well now I did. You’re welcome. Thanks. All right, so I’m gonna take us through this. We’re just gonna Roy g bi. Okay. Oh yeah, we, we gotta start with Roy cuz that’s the one that freaks everyone out the most.

It does. So I’m grouping red, pink, brown altogether cuz they have the same cause. That makes sense. Yeah. In case you didn’t know Brown m and ms do have red dye number 40 in that. They do, yes. Okay. So let, why don’t you talk about the most obvious. Common reason for strawberry milk. Blood. Yes. So yeah, there’s a lot going on in your boobs.

Breast milk is made from blood, so it will not harm your baby to ingest some and reminder it’s going into their stomach, which is full of acid, which is just gonna break that down. Yeah. And even if they ingest like. Too much. It’s, it’s just gonna give ’em like a tummy ache. It’s not gonna hurt them. Right.

And also, you don’t really know how much is in there because one drop of blood can make a big difference in the color is suspension. Right. It’s, it’s like the tiniest amount, if you’ve ever used food coloring mm-hmm. To dye white icing on a cake. You know, it’s not like use a whole bottle. It’s like, use two drops and stir it in and Yep.

Look, it’s red. So, so I’ve contemplated making a video about this before. Where I actually like take a couple drops of blood and like drop them into a cup of milk just so you can see how pink it turns. Yeah, I’ll do that. Yeah. And I was like, am I willing to cut my finger open for this? Well, we could use a, a finger pricker.

Yes, I am. I’m willing for, so we should do that. We’re gonna do it. Yeah. I think it’s really helpful to see that. And where does the blood come from? Usually from your nip op. Okay. Usually from a nipple wound. Those are really common Sometimes. It might be coming from inside your milk ducts where we have some inflammation from, say something like mastitis.

Or we might just have some broken capillaries in there. And those can happen for a wide variety. If you’ve been aggressively hand expressing and you have bruises all over your breast. Yeah. Or if you’ve been pumping on the highest setting. So if you’re pumping like on a suction of 12, And you feel like your shoulder blades are about to be pulled through your nipples.

It’s like there’s a pretty good chance we have some You’ve stopped feet capillaries. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I do wanna chat for a minute about Rusty Pipe syndrome though. Yes. Because this is an interesting one and it’s different than broken capillaries and it’s different. Yeah. So this is what we typically attribute.

Pink, red or brown milk to you in the first few days? Postpartum. Okay. It is a temporary condition. It’s painless and it’s benign. Rusty Pipe syndrome is the result of old blood left inside of the milk ducts from vascular breast engorgement. Okay, so when you’re pregnant, your breasts are doing a lot, right?

They’re going through changes. They’re big, they’re small, they’re hot, they’re cold, whatever. And there’s a really big increase in the blood flow to the breasts and to the milk ducks and all the glandular tissue that make breast milk, and they develop fast. Real quick. Sometimes some of that blood is like leftover in the ducks and it literally just has to like flush out.

Mm-hmm. And that’s why we call it rusty Pipe syndrome. Like if you’ve ever lived in an old house and you try on the water for the first time in a while and you’re like, brown water, you let it run for a while and it looks fine. That’s what we’re doing here. And it’s fine. It’s safe for your baby. And again, typically this is the first week postpartum that we might see this.

Yeah, don’t freak out. It’s okay. Don’t freak out. Absolutely. There is funny enough. One more. Cause for the red family of milk colors, please say beets. It is beets just like Wendy Pee. And you’re like, is that blood? Oh no. I just had beets. Scary. Beets are terrifying. They taste like dirt to me. I wish I liked them.

I have tried them again and again, you know. Can I tell you the way that I found to eat them? That I actually like? Yes. Which you might like right now, cuz you’re in a salad thing. Okay. Of pregnancy. Thanks, shrimp. I grate them fresh. Toss them with a little balsamic vinegar and like put them on top of my salad.

Okay. And then they’re kind of like graded carrots on top. Okay. And the vinegar kind of cuts that weird, like dirt taste good. Yeah. So I, that’s what I need. Cut. I like them that way. It’s really good. Now I just have to get my hands on a raw beet. But other red foods can also do this. Like, if you like my children, just sit down and eat two quarts of strawberries and cost me $16, your milk might be red the next day.

If you ate a red velvet cake and had a ton of red food dye, right it, and it doesn’t happen to everybody. Some people could eat more red foods and not have any of those, like little pigment molecules make it into their milk. Some people don’t. It’s just kind of random chance. Can I tell you that I hate red velvet cake and.

My mom when I was 13 and 14 and I got my first period, she had a dream that night that she baked me a red velvet cake underground like the Native Americans do. What? I don’t know, kid. Don’t quote me on this. This was her dream and she was going through a Native American phase in her life with classes at college.

I don’t think Native American people made red falt cake. No, no. That was part of the dream, but, but they had like, You know, period parties. So anyway, she threw me this big period party with red balloon. Oh, she threw you period party in her dream. I, okay. But she did, she really though. Cause I kinda love that I was, I’m still dead from embarrassment in my mind because she told so many people about it.

And so every time we see a red velvet cake, she’ll look at it and she’ll be like, remember in my dream when I threw you a period party and I mixed some drops of your flag, I disappointed she didn’t just. Do that for real. Yeah. Like it’s so over the top that it should have just happened Well now, like jokes on my daughter because I would love to do that.

Hell yes. But yeah, I do remember what it was like to be that embarrassed and we’re just gonna continue it. That’s what I think about every time I see a red velvet cake. I love that. My period, my first one, well. Let’s chat about orange milk really quick. Okay. Which kind of blends into yellow. We’re gonna, the Oy of Roy, the Oy.

In the same vein of eating foods, research has shown that if milk producing animals eat excessive amounts of carrots or sweet potatoes or other, Orange, pigmented foods, their milk can turn orange. So, you know, I don’t know if you, this happened to you when you were a little kid. I was really into carrots and my mom would always be like, don’t eat too many carrots or you’ll turn orange.

I thought she was joking. And then I watched the, at a school bus and she was not joking. My nose turned yellow and so did my kids when they were little and they loved carrots. I love that. So yeah, usually that is gonna look yellow, but it could be so pigmented as to look orange. Now yellow is fun cuz we all have yellow milk.

We all have colostrum in the beginning. Mm-hmm. But it’s not the only time your milk might be yellow. So I found out why it’s yellow. Okay. I tell me it’s beta keratin. Duh. Oh, which is why carrots are orange, beta. This in a smaller amount. Yeah. So beta keine is a red orange pigment found in plants and fruits and colorful vegetables.

The human body converts beta keratin into vitamin A. Vitamin A is fat soluble. Mm-hmm. Right. So it makes sense why this would like really stick in the fatty layer of the milk. Now, why do we have betaine in our milk? So it contributes to the antioxidant defenses in the neonate. And there was an interesting systemic review that found infants younger than six months.

Those who were fed primarily human milk had a greater blood keratinoid concentration than those fed formula. And that helps with what, again, were with your immune response. Oh, good. Yeah, so it’s an antioxidant. Right? So that’s really cool. Another, the free radicals. Yeah. Another contributor to the yellow color is way.

WHE is a protein. If you let your like cow’s milk like curdle and it separates, the liquid is gonna be light yellow. Ah, that’s whey. Whey has a yellow tined and it is present in higher concentrations during the first few weeks of life. As far as like protein ratios go. For muscle building. Yeah. So it’s, it’s gonna you know, it’s, it’s honestly not that pigmented though, but it could be contributing to that.

Interesting. And if your early, like transitional and colostrum, like separates in the fridge, it might not have that like blue tinge that we usually see with the separated milk. Mm-hmm. It might just be yellow. Cool. So this ingredient doesn’t go away, right. Beta kein and whey they’re both always in your milk.

It’s just that the amounts. Are gonna vary from time to time. Mm-hmm. So we know we’re gonna have higher amounts of those in the very beginning. With colostrum, it usually goes down, but also like you might just have gone on a carrot eating binge, or maybe your body just has more beta care team for some reason.

For some unrelated reason. So should everyone eat carrots if they’re sick, to keep their baby healthier? I mean, I don’t know. You should all eat carrots. They’re yummy. Yeah. Do it. Yeah. Anyway, that was really, I, I was like so pleased to find that answer. I just, I was like, why is gloss yellow? Yeah. That makes so much sense.

Tell me And because you know what else is yellow puss. And that scares people. Yes. They’re like, you know what other body fluid comes out of me that is terrifying. Yeah. Puss. Puss. Yeah. So you’re fine. It’s not puss, there’s not an infection. Well, there shouldn’t be. And if you think there is grown a friend.

But yeah. No, that’s great. I’m really excited about that. It is really cool, huh. All right, well let’s take a quick break and when we come back I wanna hear all about Green Milk and Blue Milk and Oh, purple milk, gray Black milk. Oh yeah. So much.

Heather, when you were nursing Heidi, did you get thirsty every single time? Every single time I sat down to nurse, it was like the Sahara Desert had taken up residents in my mouth. Same. And my go-to drink right now is Liquid iv. Oh, me too. Liquid IV makes your water work harder cuz it has a hydration multiplier in it.

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Welcome back everybody. I don’t even wanna mess around. I just wanna hear about green milk. Okay, so I, this one I have to preface with. I get a lot of pictures of milk and most commonly when someone says, why is my milk green? Let me send you a picture. I’m like, it’s bluish. Yeah, I kind of like the same color.

So blue milk might look green in yellow lighting. So like the light in your refrigerator, the light in our recording studio is very yellow, right? That can easily kind of affect the way that your eyes are seeing reflected light. If the light it’s reflecting is yellow, and we don’t all have exactly the same like cells in our eyes that.

You know, pick up colors the same. So this is subjective, right? And most of the time when people send me quote colored milk, it’s like barely pigmented. Mm-hmm. Right? However, occasionally milk might actually turn really green. Once again, we can thank our diet for that. We really only see like truly green milk if people binge like leafy greens.

Or if you have like two like green kale smoothies a day or something. Or if you had a St. Patrick’s Day celebration and you ate all green dyed food. Okay. Can I ask a question? Yes. If breast milk is made from your blood, not from, not directly from the food you eat, does this mean that we have like yellow keratin and green food dye going throughout our blood?

Mm-hmm. But our blood is always red. Yeah. Cuz of red blood cells. Because of red blood cells. Yeah. But if it was white, our blood, our white blood would then look green as well. Yeah. I mean, if we only had like colorless plasma, it’s possible. That if we like binged on a bunch of pigmented foods, and that’s like all that our intestines absorbed into our bloodstream, but honestly, it’s like the concentrations aren’t that high, which is why this doesn’t happen that often.

Right. Well, and I guess also since urine is made from your blood mm-hmm. And urine can change colors. Oh, yeah. When you have asparagus, when you have beets, when you, yeah. Right. Yeah. I’ve even had people have orange P from different vitamins. Right. And green. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So it, it’s this, it’s, it’s not the same process.

It is a parallel process, okay. Of extracting things from your blood. Okay. I just wanted to address that because I think a lot of people would be confused about that. Yes. And we do often say like, oh, it doesn’t really matter what you eat. Your baby’s fine. That’s not why they’re gassy. And it’s probably not like, however, it, it’s not like people aren’t texting me every day with like shamrock green milk.

You know? This really usually does take a pretty excessive amount of eating those foods. Yeah. And when you’re excessive like that, you know what you did. Yes. Yeah. Now, blue is a different story. It’s more like yellow. So we see bluish milk. Usually when you’re pumping higher volumes of milk or you are feeding your baby at longer intervals.

That milk typically has a higher water content and more water soluble nutrients. Okay. And it’s gonna be lacking that fat. That like higher fat content that’s like reflecting the white light back at us. However, the interesting thing is usually that Blue Milk has a higher level of Cassin. Cassin is a protein Cassin and whey are like the two main proteins in breast milk.

We have a ratio of Cassin and whey. When babies are born, it’s about 80% weigh, 20% Cassin, and over time, that shifts to about 60 40. Okay. The ratio of this is dynamic though. And you know, we tend to see more of that Cassin as baby gets older. Cassin is blue. It looks blue, it reflects blue light back at us.

So that’s why when all that fat comes out of suspension right, and the milk separates that watery part looks blue. And so preemies, when you’re pumping for a premature baby mm-hmm. There’s more protein in your milk. So does that mean if, if you’re pumping, it’s probably more whey. More way. Yeah, I was gonna say cuz I haven’t seen a difference in NICU people pumping.

Mm-hmm. But I definitely see a difference in people with hyper lactation and oversupply. Yeah. And, and, and usually when I get the pictures of like, why is my milk blue? It’s like with a six month old or, and Yeah. Or they’re like, it’s high lactose, isn’t it? Mm-hmm. So you’re saying it’s not the lactose No, the sugars, as far as I know, aren’t pigmented like that.

Interesting. Mm-hmm. Sugars dissolve in water. They’re not suspended. Maureen’s so smart you guys. Anyway, so whether your milk is yellowish or bluish, it doesn’t matter. Those proteins are both good. We want them. It’s just like, you know, I don’t know if you guys have ever looked at like skim milk compared to 2% and they’re slightly different colors.

It’s cuz they’ve got slightly different ratios of stuff in them. You know, it’s fine. Yeah, they’re both milk. I used to think it was skin milk, and I was so livid as a child that my mom would make me drink skin milk, and I was like, this is disgusting. What kind of mother are you? And I’m glad you drink your skin milk.

I was like, this is made from skin and that is so disgusting. How did you think they made it? I don’t know. I was like three years old. We, we cleared it up. We made up. Good. I’m glad. Anyway, so Blue Milk is fine. It’s very, very normal. This is the most common color people ask me about. Okay. How about the uncommon colors like, Purple.

Purple is an interesting one. So I was not expecting to find Purple Milk articles online cuz I have never heard of this, but I found a case study so I thought I’d throw it in here. You know, why not? It’s part of the rainbow. We’re on the pee. I wanna hear it. Actually, it’s violet in the fro gib. Anyway, so this is new.

I saw the case study about a mother in the immediate postpartum pumping purple milk. Ooh, is this a med? No, it was unexplained. So because this color was novel, the mother was advised to like withhold the milk while specialist looked into it. I mean, she had like a bunch of different specialists all looking into it.

In the end, the breast surgeon concluded the coloration was due to ductile, ectasia, ecec ducts, and hormonal stimulation. Ectasia is the dilatation or distension of a tubular structure. Okay. I don’t know why that would cause purple milk. I also don’t know how purple this milk was. There were no pictures on the case study.

Mother was cleared to feed us normal and the color cleared up in a few days. I wonder if this was just a weird case of rusty pipe syndrome. Mm-hmm. Where it was purplish. Mm-hmm. Interesting. Yeah, I don’t know. I, I’d like to see that cuz I really thought ductal lochia caused like green discharge. I have no idea.

I would guess that this surgeon was just like sweating bullets and he was just like, it’s this term and it’s fine. Goodbye. Goodbye. Don’t call, don’t write. I mean, they did like ultrasounds and stuff too. I think it was, it’s pretty crazy. But God, how annoy speaking of protecting your postpartum, If you pump purple milk, it’s probably fine.

Oh my gosh. Okay. Anyway, purple brings us into gray and black, which like you mentioned, is medication typically. Mm-hmm. Okay. Some medications like minocycline, which is an acne doxycycline, right. Right. Doxycycline can do this. A bunch of different medications can cause your breast milk to look gray or black.

It could stain in your baby’s teeth also. Yes, sometimes like much older blood that’s stuck in your milk, ducks can come out like black specs, like coffee ground. It’s not very common though, but if it’s like, if that color’s like truly blended into the milk, it’s probably medication. So that is not very common to have gray or black milk, but I thought I’d just throw it in there.

Oh, so doxycycline and minocycline are not recommended while breastfeeding for this reason. Yes, it is known Anyway. Yeah, that’s, that’s our rainbow friend. What do you think? I think basically you’re fine. Yeah, you’re fine. Yep. However, if you have an oversupply, you should probably get that fixed. Yeah. So I actually, if I have time, anytime in my whole freaking life, I’m gonna try to make a PDF about this, because I hate looking at those little color charts and they’re like, green means antibodies, blue means this.

They don’t, that’s not what they mean. So I’m done reading that on other people’s non-scientific stuff, antibodies. Are not light reflective, are they? I don’t know, but that’s not what it means apparently, so. Well, I don’t think they’re very small. They’re tiny. They’re not large. I wonder if it’s just that they’re not molecules like in suspension if they’re like fully dissolved in the liquid or whatever.

I don’t really know like how that works exactly. I mean, yes, you have antibodies in there for sure. Yeah. Yeah, it and also like, it doesn’t matter. Yeah. Whether you have more or less of them one day, I don’t know. People get very upset about it, and I just want y’all people to know. I don’t care. You don’t need to care.

You’re a dynamic organism. Yeah. Uhhuh. And apparently your blood, if it wasn’t red, would also be these colors. And it’s just transporting these little particles around and it’s coming out in your milk because it’s got a nice white palette. It’s like for all you artists out there, when you put that nice coat of gesso on the canvas, yeah.

Mm-hmm. And then you paint on top of it. Yeah. So your milk is the gesso. Okay. It’s a good analogy. All right. And now we’re gonna close with a song from Wizard of Oz. Okay. We’re actually gonna close with awards and reviews. Oh, that, that’s probably better. People want to hear that.

If you’re pumping milk away from your baby at all at work or wherever you go, you deserve a bougie product. To make that easier for you, you deserve a series chiller and frankly, I could not live without one right now. The series Chiller is an excellent way to store your breast milk safely, and it keeps your breast milk cold for 24 hours.

It is the only thing I use to transport my breast milk to and from work while I’m working. It’s got a sleek and beautiful design. Lots of great colors, high quality materials and manufacturing. Sir Chill also has other products that you might wanna check out too. My personal favorite is the milk stash.

They have a great nipple shield that actually changes colors and it’s not clear like all the other ones. And you know how we feel about that. If you want to have your very own series chiller, please go to the Lincoln R show notes and use code milkman at 15 at checkout. That’s milkman 15 for 15% off your series.

Chill Products. Enjoy.

All right, today’s award goes to Kristen Tallarico Smallwood. Whom I love and Kristen says, my recent win is I finally decided after six months to let go of my fear to nurse in public. It’s not fair to Lucas or myself since nursing him in public, we’ve been able to do so much more and are all around happier.

Yay. Yay, Kristen. Thank you. We’re super proud of you and I’m gonna give you the milk to Go award cuz you’re on the go. You can do anything now. You can do anything. You really can. We’re so excited for you. Way to get outta the house. Yeah, well I wanna read an Apple review cuz they make me feel good. I hope they make you feel good too.

This one is from Meg Hawk 18 and they say, I wish I were better at putting into words how much I love this podcast because I know I will not do it justice. Heather and Maureen are crazy passionate about helping women be their best selves. And along the way, sharing things to make your breastfeeding journey better.

I feel good about myself as a mother after listening to them. They’re relatable, hilarious, and give the most up to date and evidence-based knowledge. Well, thanks. We hope. Thanks, Meg. We hope so. That’s like our whole goal. Yeah. Seriously. I really appreciate it. Yeah, we love you guys. And thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Milk Minute podcast.

And if you wanna listen to our new podcast Beyond the Boob, it’s available on apple subscription, or you could hit us up on Patreon patreon.com/milk minute podcast. Yeah. And next time you look at your pumped milk, I want you to just not freak out. Because it’s totally fine. Just appreciate yourself and all the things your blood is transporting, and for God’s sakes, drink a kale smoothie.

Okay, until next week everybody. Bye-bye.

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