Sick Kids

So today we were supposed to have a playdate with a local mom's group that I joined. So far I have only made it to one event because life keeps getting in the way. My three year old and I were really excited about going to check out the new play area at the mall. She cried several times through the night and was cranky in the evening last night. I was worried she was getting sick but hoped for the best. She woke up running a fever and the day went down hill from there. I ended up taking her to the doctor because she said her throat hurt and I was worried that maybe she had strep. Turned out she had an ear infection so he didn't swab her throat because we agreed it would just be torturing her if he was already giving her the antibiotic to begin with. I couldn't get the poor soul to take any motrin or tylenol until about 5 this evening after her temp made it to 103.1 under her arm and she was so sick that I was able to just pour it in her mouth. I knew the instant that the motrin kicked in because it was like she was raised from the dead and became Maura again. I know that it will only last a couple of hours but I am going to enjoy her while it lasts.

My poor 8 month old son has to feel totally neglected today though because I have nursed him and put him right back in the exersaucer everytime or in the swing because she had needed cuddled all day. I thought it was tough when she was sick and was the only child today has definitely been a learning experience.

Amy

As if the medical model of care wasn't impersonal enough

Here is a link to information about new technology. A machine called Birth Track. It uses sensors that are placed on the maternal cervix and the baby's head to track dilation and the station of the baby. Just one more way for them to keep the laboring mom in bed and flat on her back.

http://www.medgadget.com/archives/2007/02/clm_computerize.html

They have always said you forget the pain

Here's an article about how women remember the discomfort of childbirth. I have always heard people say that you forget (I know some people who want to tell their horror stories would disagree). I can say that my daughter was three in September and the only thing I remember as what I can say was truly painful was the last 15 minutes before I started pushing. I was feeling the urge to push but was not fully dilated so that was hard. The rest of my labor I was able to take one contraction at a time though. With my son who is almost 8 months old I can't really say that I really remember pain just exhaustion.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/132671.php

Baby Born from Full Ovary Transplant

I am not sure that I really have alot to say about this one. I think this is fantastic that the mom was able to have a baby. Sure her sister could have been a surrogate but I think that she got to experience pregnancy is wonderful. I also think it's great that it may be able to be used for cancer patients is great. After all if a man is diagnosed with cancer they can bank sperm for later use before they receive treatments. That's how Lance Armstrong got to be a dad. It's great that women with cancer when they are young may have an option. I am not so sure that I agree with taking an ovary out at a young age to be used when a woman is in her 40's or 50's. I think maybe that is a little like playing god but that's just my opinion.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28164129/

Pregnancy Cravings

Ok I didn't have incredibly strange cravings. I didn't crave pickles and ice cream (well yeah ice cream but I crave that even when I am not pregnant :). With my first I crave caramel cremes through most of the first and second trimesters after that they caused too much heartburn for me to tolerate them. I also craved grilled cheese sandwiches. My husband tells our daughter that she is partially constructed of grilled cheese sandwiches. With her I didn't want anything that had tomato sauce in it. We eat pizza at our house at least once a week and at one point he looked at me and said "We haven't had pizza in months what's up with that?" The thought of tomato sauce made me have heartburn without even eating it. With my son I crave tomato sauce. Couldn't get enough of it. I also crave three musketeers bars. I sent my husband out one night at 8 pm for a three musketeers. I think that was the only time in both pregnancies that I sent him out for something so he and I agree that he got off pretty easily. Now when I was in labor with my son I wanted a fresh fruit salad. The midwives wanted me to eat and that was what I wanted. God bless my dad he tried like heck to get me one but didn't really have any luck but god love him he tried to get his baby what she wanted. What did you crave? Did you send your partner out at odd times to get it for you? Here's a link to an article about cravings.

http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/ent-life/you_ate_what__women_talk_pregnancy_cravings_12-10-2008.html

Talking about alternative therapies

In my last post I talked about chiropractic care and other alternative therapies. This article talks about the numbers of people trying alternative care options. It doesn't really talk about their benefits during pregnancy but they are numerous. Chiropractic can help with the general aches and pains, sciatica, a malpositioned baby and more. I have heard many women say that they went into labor shortly after and adjustment or were adjusted during labor and that their labor picked up afterwards. This didn't work for me but I do know that my labor with my daughter went much more smoothly than my labor with my son and with her I was getting regular adjustments during the last half of my pregnancy and with my son I only went periodically when I was very uncomfortable. There may be something to that.

Accupuncture and accupressure also are beneficial during pregnancy. They can help with morning sickness, turning breech babies, relaxation and I am sure there are other benefits that I still need to learn about. I have never tried accupuncture because the thought of someone sticking needles into my body that don't have to be there is kind of scary.

Herbals are something that you have to be careful with during pregnancy and breastfeeding. I have used herbals for weight loss (in the past), nausea, to try to induce labor which did not work, and to increase my milk supply. There are herbals that are safe for use during pregnancy and can help with morning sickness and nausea but always check with your care provider first.

What have you tried in the form of alternative therapies and did it help you?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28159493/

Tips for Sciatica pain during pregnancy

Here is an article from yahoo news about dealing with sciatica pain during pregnancy. I have two things to add. I had a wonderful belly support during my pregnancies. It was called a bellybra and I got it from JCPenney. I don't know that it so much helped with sciatic pain but it helped my back and my hips. I had TERRIBLE sciatic pain when I was pregnant with my daughter. I cried, couldn't sleep, couldn't drive, couldn't go to work it was simply awful. My chiropractor became my best friend. Without him I don't think I would have survived (although I know I would have but not very pleasantly). Within 48 hours of the first adjustment and lots of sitting and lying on ice packs I was about 90% better. I didn't try any other alternative therapies such as accupuncture or massage but the chiropractic care I received from then to the rest of my pregnancy worked wonders. Feel free to chime in and tell us what helped for you back pain and discomforts during pregnancy.

http://www.covenanthealth.org/HealthDay/12_2008/621974

This explains so much!

My family is made up of many people who have a mouthful of sweet teeth. This article talks about a genetic link in craving sweets. This explains a lot for me.

http://www.babycenter.com/204_gene-may-make-kids-crave-junk-food_10304049.bc

A Mother's Boutique is having a contest

Judy at A Mother's Boutique is giving away a $50 gift certificates for 5 weeks to celebrate her new blog. Check it out at http://mommynewsblog.com A Mother's Boutique has an awesome selection of maternity and breastfeeding clothing, accessories and breastpumps and supplies.

The Today show and Doulas

If you saw the bit on the Today show about doulas it was not very complimentary. It referred to doulas as a luxury and said buyer beware. The only person they really interviewed was a doctor who has banned doulas from her hospital. They didn't interview anyone who had used a doula. They didn't talk about the benefits of doula support or the amount of work that goes into training and certifying. The article on their website was a little better. Please feel free to write to the Today show in support of what doulas do and the many benefits of doula support.
Here is the link to the article on their site.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27808452/

"New" info on prevention of c-sections

This article talks about waiting out a stalled labor for two hours. According to the article if medical professionals would wait for two hours before making the decision to do a c-section for "failure to progress" they could eliminate 130,000 c-sections a year. It is a great article that discusses the health risks of c-sections and increasing rates of them.




http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/127827.php

And now it is happening here

And now they are finding formula here that has melamine in it. They are saying that they have trace amounts that they don't feel would be harmful. When it was happening in China they said there was no way to set a limit on what would be safe/harmful but now they are saying not to worry. I say anything that is in there that shouldn't be is a problem but that's just me.




http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27914218/

Hopefully this will help prevent premature births

Here's to hoping that this will help find better treatments for pre-term labor and that they don't use this knowledge to evict babies who aren't ready to arrive yet.



http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=94454

Study on pre-term labor

Here is a link to an article about the pre-term labor medicine nifedipine. It shows that it actually has little benefit.




http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/621713.html

Yet one more good reason to breastfeed

I can only try to imagine what my 3 year old would be like if I hadn't breastfed her. I shudder at the thought.



http://www.seton.net/health_a_to_z/health_news/health_news/2008/10/29/breast_fed_baby_may_mean_better_behaved_child

This fortunately was not the case for me. I gained more than 40 pounds with both of my pregnancies and my first was 8 lbs 0 oz and my son was 7 lbs 14 oz. Not exactly what I would consider huge.

http://www.pregnancy-info.net/in_the_news276.html

Neat Story

Here's what happens when the lights go out.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/10/30/netherlands.baby.boom/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

New report on a LARGE baby born vaginally with no meds. I think this woman truly deserves a medal. It does show that the diagnosis cephalopelvic disproportion is overused.

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/index.php?rn=222561&cl=10320586&

Two great articles about childbirth and doulas

Here are links to two articles from usa today about the current state of maternity care and the benefits of doulas.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-10-08-childbirth-fixes_N.htm

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-10-08-childbirth-costs_N.htm

Nestle

Alot of my friends and family here me saying that we don't buy Nestle products in our house. I then usually have to tell the story of why I choose to boycott Nestle. Here are a few links about the evil, underhanded stuff they do. They break rules and babies get sick and die.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/may/15/medicineandhealth.lifeandhealth

http://www.breastfeeding.com/advocacy/advocacy_boycott.html

Nestle is an extremely difficult company to boycott because they seem to have a hand in everything. I am in the process of compiling a list and will post it when I have a complete list. I am sure that even once I get the list up I will probably end up amending it many times. Feel free to join me in this boycott and speak up for all of the babies who can't.

Amy

53,000 sick babies in China

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26827110/

If only these babies were being breastfed this wouldn't be happening to all of these children.

Breastfeeding and weight loss

Here is an article that talks about mom's that breastfeed losing the baby weight faster. First of all this really is old news. I think every once in awhile they put things out as breaking news hoping that people will forget they've heard it before. Unfortunately for me I eat like I am breastfeeding triplets and not just one baby so the weight just doesn't seem to want to budge. Oh well.



http://www.webmd.com/baby/news/20081208/breastfeeding-helps-moms-lose-weight

Pretty wild story

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26737189/

Just goes to show that most babies just need to be caught and not "delivered"

My worst fear as a mom

I read this article and felt myself tearing up. I can't tell you how many times I have gotten up to listen to my children breathing. This is one of those things that no one should ever have to experience.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/family/09/12/sids.infants/index.html

Interesting article

I came across this article on one of my favorite mom's sites http://www.pittsburghmom.com/. They have a latest news link and this one was on there. I do wonder though when they do these studies how they distinguish between spontaneous labors and induced labors. Does synthetic oxytocin (pitocin) have the same effect as natural oxytocin does? Also what about mom's whose labor has started on it's own but ended in c-section? I wish they would make this stuff clearer in these studies. Any thoughts?

http://health.discovery.com/news/healthscout/article.html?article=619064&category=30&year=2008

China launches baby formula probe

This article talks about a recall on infant formula in China. They believe dairy farmers were adding a dangerous chemical to milk that has been linked to kidney stones in dozens of babies and one death. Very scary stuff. Here is the link to the article. That being said have you ever googled "infant formula recalls?" It is really frightening what some of them have been recalled for.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26667736/

Here is a list I found of past recalls.

http://www.naba-breastfeeding.org/images/Recalls.pdf

Article about post-partum depression

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08219/902077-114.stm

I think it is fantastic that this program is being offered to women that deliver at Magee and are experiencing post-partum depression. It would be great to see this offered on a larger scale. I do agree that with Dr. Cheryl Beck that a traumatic and/or difficult delivery or c-section can be a contributing factor in ppd. It is a very scary time for mother's whose baby has had fetal distress and 10 people come running into a room to see what the problem is and then if they go rushing you off for a c-section it can be very traumatizing for all involved. Of course as the article states having longer maternity leaves and better coverage would help but we probably won't see that anytime in the next 20 years. You have to wonder why the belief is that it takes 9 months to create a baby but people think it should take only 6 weeks or less to recover from pregnancy and childbirth.

I think this is so neat and I wanted to share.

As you can see on our website I have a daughter named Maura Jane. When I was pregnant with her I played a song to her every night from about 27 weeks until the end. She is now almost 2 1/2 and she still loves that song. She asks all the time to hear her song and tries to sing along with it. A few weeks ago she wasn't feeling well and woke up several times through the night crying. The only thing that calmed her was that song. I absolutely love it. I am currently 27 weeks with this pregnancy and have finally picked a song to play to this baby and am going to start tonight playing it for him. I never really believed this would work when I was pregnant with her but it does seem to work. Try it, it may surprise you.

Amy