Between caring for a baby and caring for themselves, breastfeeding moms have a lot of responsibility. If you're a breastfeeding mom, don't slack off in the nutrition department. Ensure that your diet allows you to meet your child's nutritional needs. A lack of adequate B-12 in your diet can directly affect your breastfed child.
B-12 and Breast Milk
Your dietary intake of vitamin B-12, also known as cobalamin, is directly reflected in the B-12 of your breast milk. According to the American College of Healthcare Sciences, strict vegetarians need to supplement their diets with B-12 in order to receive sufficient amounts of B-12 while pregnant or lactating. Mothers who are malnourished run the risk of producing breast milk that is vitamin B-12 deficient, and that can have negative health affects on your breastfed child.
Symptoms of B-12 Deficiency
A lack of adequate B-12 can cause you to feel fatigued, weak and constipated. B-12 is essential for maintaining a healthy nervous system, and a deficiency can cause nerve damage characterized by numbness and tingling in the hands and feet. Cognitive changes such as confusion, memory deficiencies and depression can also result from B-12 deficiency. Chronic or severe B-12 deficiency can result in permanent nerve damage. Infants that suffer from a lack of B-12 may fail to thrive, suffer from movement disorders and be delayed in their development, according to the Office of Dietary Supplements.
Megaloblastic Anemia
Vitamin B-12 is crucial to the production of red blood cells. If you aren't receiving enough B-12, you and your breastfed child are running the risk of becoming anemic. Megaloblastic anemia is a condition in which your bone marrow production of red blood cells decreases, and the red blood cells that are produced tend to be abnormally large, immature and deficient in hemoglobin, according to the Linus Pauling Institute.
Treatment
Repairing B-12 deficiency may be as simple as correcting the dietary shortfalls that are present in your eating habits. If your B-12 deficiency is serious enough, your doctor may suggest B-12 injections. The ODS states that the initial dosage used to treat B-12 deficiency can be as much as 2000 mcg of oral B-12 per day, a dosage that is gradually decreased as the deficiency is corrected. The recommended dietary allowance for B-12 is 2.8 mcg for a woman who is lactating. Pregnant women are advised to take 2.6 mcg daily. For those who aren't pregnant or lactating, the RDA is 2.4 mcg.
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