Toddler Tha Sophat has found a novel solution to getting his milk feeds – suckling directly from a cow’s udder. The 18-month-old toddler has been missing his mum’s breastfeeding after she left their local Cambodia to find work in Thailand.
Tha, who lives with his grandfather in Pheas, a village in Siem Reap province, watched a calf nurse from the cow and decided to have a go too.
“They blame me and have told me not to allow him to suckle from the cow anymore. They say the boy will be ashamed when he grows up and that he will be naughty,” said Um Oeung, Tha’s granddad, after neighbours and local officials revealed they were unhappy about the nursing.
Um revealed that after Tha’s mum stopped breastfeeding, he became ill, and when they tried to take him away from the cow, he wouldn’t stop crying.
The youngster is now allowed one feed from the cow each day and been feeding this way since July. “His health is fine, he is strong and he doesn’t have diarrhea,” said Um, reported The Daily Mail.
Tha’s parents have left to find work since their family home was destroyed by a storm.
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