Not so long ago I was at a friend’s house having a cup of tea - lactation tea of course - and lamenting the trials and tribulations of breast feeding.

The conversation went like this:

ME: "I just don’t have enough milk." I explained the daily ritual of expressing, pumping, squeezing and kneading my boobs until drop by drop I had enough to fill a tablespoon.

HER: "How long will you keep expressing for?"

ME: "Well", I joked "if it means I never have to get my period again, I might express for ever!"

Then I thought, 'but what would I do with the milk?' Visions of breastmilk muffins, breastmilk cakes and breastmilk cappuccinos filled my head. Could I bake with breastmilk and expect my friends to eat it? Would I even tell them? Would my baking still rise?

My rambling thoughts were interrupted.

HER: "I give mine to my dog".

I was shocked. My gob hung down to the floor, words couldn’t find their way out.

ME: "Your dddddog?" I stuttered.

HER: "Yeah the dog loves it," my friend said totally unaware of my stupor.

It seemed so unfair that my friend’s shaggy dog got more breastmilk than my four month old son. Seeing the predicament she went to the freezer and pulled out a bag.

HER: "Have this."

I had no idea what it was, turns out it was frozen breastmilk. You can keep it in the freezer? Obviously I don’t freeze my meager efforts. Now this brings up a whole series of issues in my mind.

ME (Still flabbergasted by the dog let alone receiving frozen breastmilk): "Is it ok to use somebody else’s milk?"

HER: "Well you drink milk from a cows nipples don’t you?"

Good point. But I don’t sit at a cows kitchen bench drinking tea and eating biscuits. Or maybe I do. Yet as the frozen bag sat in my hands it didn’t seem right. It still didn’t seem right as I let it thaw on the bench. Drink me, drink me it called. I did some research.

For hundreds of years women (until the widespread use of formula) have breastfed each others children. Known as cross nursing or using a wet nurse, the practice has been with us since the dawn of civilization. The World health organization recommends breastfeeding your own baby, expressing your own milk or using another’s mothers milk, and then lastly formula. In comparison the La Leche League actually discourages cross-nursing because of the possibility of disease.

If the idea doesn’t actually bother you and you live in California (not me on either accounts) a company called Certified Household Staffing (CHS) claims to have up to 100 wet nurses on its books. If you can’t afford the $2000 USD a week fee then just ask Salma Hayek who did it for free in Sierra Leone. If you don’t have her phone number then just find a friend who uses it for dog food. After all milk banks use it for premature babies (albeit sterilized), so it cant be that bad can it?

Visions of breastmilk cupcakes are slowly filling my head.