#1 grandson is of course going to press once again for his favorite name – Cool Ass Mojo – and once again isn’t likely to prevail. That’s okay, he can name his own child thusly. Grandpa and I are just delighted, hoping this birth will be much easier on our sweet daughter who has proven herself to be an extremely good Mom. Her family is happily well-adjusted and for her good choices we are grateful.

Meanwhile, Grandpa’s intensive work schedule in various regional public school systems kicked into high gear when school started in August, bringing home more than ‘the usual’ season-change cold this year. Some of you may know that the new H1N1 flu is officially rampant here in the Southeast. Some wish to call it swine flu, but it’s also got elements of bird flu and Spanish flu – a regular Chimera. So I just call it the Unicorn Flu, in honor of the worldwide panic it’s engendered since its so-public appearance in Mexico City this past April.

Hubby at first thought it was an attack of allergies, though he did have a headache and some fever to go with his sneezing and coughing. But not bad enough to cause him to miss work, so he no doubt helped spread it around. A couple of days later I came down with the sneeze attacks, head and body aches, sore throat and fever. I told him it had to be the flu, since allergies aren’t contagious.

Flu instead of just the usual cold because the cold doesn’t knock you down. Or, it doesn’t knock US down. I was down for a full 24 hours with this, and the fever was high enough to signal something more than rhinovirus. Still nursing a nasty congested cough two weeks later, with enough of a leftover fever to suspect I’ve graduated to bacterial bronchitis or mild pneumonia. Haven’t gone to a doctor and so long as I’m on top of it, won’t. It’s harvest time here on the homestead, I’ve been keeping up with that and preservation, can still play 5 holes of mountainside disc golf without trouble, and have been drinking a lot of my anti-viral/antibiotic herbal tea both hot and cold, with raw honey. I think I’ll live.

Deal is, for all the super-hype for this flu, it’s not nearly as bad as some other flus we’ve managed to catch over the years. While I wasn’t inclined to eat anything, there was no nausea or vomiting like there was with the Hong Kong flu back in the ’70s. Which nearly killed us for sure, though we were healthy 20-somethings at the time. I’ve read quite a bit of alternative super-hype about the vaccines they’ve rushed into production for this flu, and that’s over the top as well.

The rampant paranoia about forced vaccination and quarantine is overblown, given that the first vaccine is still weeks away and the flu itself is rampant. Not even bad enough to close any schools, it’s making the rounds pretty much like your average cold and not causing serious absenteeism or an increase in hospitalizations on a par with the average flu season around here in January. I see no indications from CDC that they’re going to force us all to get shots now that a majority of us have already had the flu. What would be the point in that? If it ever was the plan, the vaccine is too little too late in a region where the epidemic has already taken hold (and just about over by now).

So. If you happen to live in one of the states where this flu hasn’t yet made itself rampant, you may well wish to get the vaccine. Especially if you are in the high-risk groups, which in this case includes healthy young people. I’ve advised younger daughter to get vaccinated a.s.a.p. because she’s pregnant – and pregnant women have depressed immune functions by purposeful nature so they don’t attack their own baby growing in the womb. They account for many of the deaths reported for this flu, so that’s a definite risk. We’ve got our fingers crossed that she’ll make it to when they release the vaccine, and is first in line. Prayers to that effect offered daily!

For the rest of us, don’t worry so much. It’s not that bad.

I had two babies in diapers before I was 20. The hospital sent #2 home with several boxes of a nifty new product called “Pampers.” Disposable diapers the baby uses once before they go to the landfill to take up space for 500 years! I thought they were totally cool. Until I got home and tried to fit them on my newborn boy-child.

Perhaps first time mothers don’t know this, but there’s a difference between girl babies and boy babies. My girl had ample hips and chubby legs, never had a problem fitting diapers – cloth or disposables – on her. My boy’s little bottom end came to a point. No hips, spindly legs, and a pee mechanism that didn’t care which way it was pointed. This was before disposable manufacturers figured out that the gaping gaps around the legs weren’t particularly good at catching any of the products diapers traditionally are meant to catch and hold. My boy peed straight out of the leg hole more often than he ever caught the “super-absorbant” part. And he had diarrhea for 3 straight months…

So despite my initial reaction to the idea of disposable diapers, I quickly learned they were useless and went back to old fashioned cloth diapers. Which, despite having poked enough holes in my fingers to donate blood at the Red Cross, actually did work for the purpose diapers were invented to address.

We were too poor for a diaper service, so I washed my own (sometimes in the sink because we didn’t have a washing machine and couldn’t always afford the laundromat) and hung them out to dry in the sun. Which answers the question I see asked a lot in diaper discussions about retained odors in cloth diapers even after washing. A little fresh air and sunshine works wonders, and the UV actually kills any leftover microorganisms (which can contribute greatly to diaper rash).

So as I’m finishing up my projects for pregnant daughter #2 and collecting odds and ends she doesn’t have yet from my local Freecycle Network, I’m also considering buying her some newfangled cloth diapers, wool covers and a nice soaking pail. I’ve been surfing to see what’s up since last we had a newborn in-house. I already knew that cloth diapers are certifiably more “Green” than disposables, and I knew they’re actually better for the baby’s sensitive skin. There are issues to consider – not the least of which is that day cares generally REQUIRE disposables for convenience – so here’s some of the information I’ve found…

Did you know that disposable diapers on plastic take 500 years to biodegrade? That according to the EPA, 20 billion disposable diapers were dumped into landfills in the US last year, creating 3.5 million tons of waste? That’s 10,000 tons – 20 million pounds – per day!

Cloth diapers are healthier for babies. Disposables come complete with chemicals associated with health problems, and increase the incidence of diaper rash – and subsequent infections – due to chemical allergies, poor air flow and longer time between changes.

Cloth diapers laundered at home (my daughter works from home) can save a parent between $800 and $1,600 over the 2.5 years the baby needs them. Using a diaper service is about as expensive as disposables, but many couples will choose that option based on health and environmental reasons.

Now, cloth diapers can be flat, pre-folded or all-in-one. I like prefolds best, and polyester velcro covers. The all-in-ones are easier for changing, but more difficult to clean. Six of one, half a dozen of the other, prefolds and covers still look like the best option. I was delighted to find that there’s been some nifty developments in diaper world since I left it behind, too.

I found a thing called “G-diapers” that consist of an outer shell similar to a diaper wrap, an absorbent – and FLUSHABLE – insert, and a nylon snap-in liner. They come with a “swishstick” for breaking up the disposable insert in the toilet. Of course, you have to tear the pouch open before it goes in the toilet, so you’ll be handling baby-ick just as much as you would if you just used regular cloth diapers. The trick is to soak the soiled diaper in the toilet, then hold it and rinse it thoroughly during the flush before then tossing it into the diaper pail to soak before laundering. Biggest drawback to that are husbands and older children who can’t manage to figure out there’s a diaper soaking before they use and flush the toilet. Plumbers are expensive.

Now, there is still the issue of cotton diapers and chlorine bleach, which releases dioxin. You can get unbleached cotton, but there’s also the issue of the crop itself. Fully half of the world’s pesticides are sprayed on cotton. What else is there? Why… Hemp! There are all sorts of “green” sources out there specializing in hemp diapers and associated products, as well as hemp/unbleached cotton blends and even naturally colored, organically grown cotton – I love the soft greens and blues and beige. Hemp is naturally anti-microbial and has eight times the tensile strength and four times the durability of cotton.

So that’s my plan. Granddaughter is due around this time next month, so I’d better get busy ordering!

Links:

Diaper Pin: Is Hemp Really Better?

Growing Greens Hemp Diapers

DiaperCuts: Hemp Products

eartheasy: Cloth Diapers

Cloth Diapering Pros and Cons

Mongabay: Diapers Go Green

DiaperWare: Prefolds and Flats

Back in the olden days when I was having babies breast feeding was frowned upon as something only poor people did. I don’t really know why, since my mother breast fed all five of us siblings and we turned out healthy enough. Of course, when I was having babies pediatricians also advised Moms to start feeding their infants solid food (cereals, fruit) at the ripe old age of 6 weeks, too.

In the years since then medical science has actually investigated how nature designed babies to be fed, and discovered that human breast milk in most circumstances is the very best thing a baby human could be getting in the way of nutrition. Almost as if they finally figured out that cow’s milk is for baby cows! What’ll they think of next?

In addition to being the most easily digested animal protein infants can get, breast milk also comes with antibodies that protect babies against diseases and allergies, and breast feeding generally doesn’t cause the baby to swallow air which leads to vomiting, upset stomach, and unhappy babies.

There’s an additional plus to breast feeding your baby – you won’t have to spend a lot of time boiling bottles and nipples and rings and caps, mixing formula and heating it while the baby’s screaming to be fed. Breast feeding promotes healthy mother-infant bonding, stimulates infant sensory development and helps to prevent mastitis (infection of the mammary glands in the mother, which may help protect her from breast cancer later in life.

Moreover, people are starting to get over their strange belief that seeing a mother breast feeding an infant is something akin to pornography. Where that came from heaven only knows, but I do have some sneaking (and decidedly feminist) suspicions about that.

Now, there are of course issues that argue against breast feeding your baby and these should be considered. If you have HIV or active tuberculosis you shouldn’t breast feed. Duh! There are also certain medicines, drugs and alcohol that will pass through the milk and harm the baby.

All of these things are fairly self-evident for contraindications most people could have figured out for themselves. But then there are modern poisons in our environment and daily food supply that can harm the baby too, and these are not so well known. A concerned mother should think about having herself tested for accumulations of certain pesticides, mercury and other heavy metals if she thinks she may be at risk.

Another consideration for Moms that can outweigh the home and traveling convenience of breast feeding is her career. If she works outside the home breast feeding can be difficult. Sure, there are some workplaces that will allow Mom to bring her infant and breast feed on demand, but a lot more that won’t. And while Mom could extract milk with a pump for the caregiver to feed from a bottle, that doesn’t do much for her engorgement while at work during normal feeding time. Some mothers pump in the bathroom and throw the milk away (or save it in the work fridge to take home), but that’s inconvenient as well.

This one’s got to be up to Mom. She can stay home for the first two months and breast feed, then stop breast feeding when she goes back to work. Or do the pump thing. Or find a job that allows her to work from home or bring the baby.

At any rate, there’s a wealth of great information out there from the National Institutes of Health and breast feeding support organizations. Click on some of the links below and follow their article links to find answers to any questions you’ve got. The decision to breast feed is one a young mother should make as early in her pregnancy as possible. If for no other reason than to allow her the time to toughen up those nipples before the baby comes along. They’ll get some abuse, and you don’t really want to be feeding that baby blood, do you?

Links:

La Leche League International

Medline: Breast Feeding

Breastfeeding Support and Attitude

US HHS: Breastfeeding – Best for Baby. Best for Mom.

American Academy of Pediatrics: Breastfeeding

Crone, noun
A wizened elderly woman. Feminine version of sage.

It’s Halloween, and since I happen to be a certifiable crone, I’ll begin this last chapter of the series on birthing options with some tales of witchcraft and bloody deeds of persecution that at one time threatened to eradicate the very existence of the ‘Medicine Women’ who traditionally attended the birth of new generations. The wise crones and grandmothers who tended the health, love lives and fertility of mothers, daughters and sisters back when the patriarchs of shamanism believed women to be chattel property like horses or goats, untouchable in their fertile ‘curse’ and dutifully banished from the household entirely for the duration of their menses.

It’s not a pretty history. From Witches, Midwives, and Nurses by Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English:

“Women have always been healers. They were the unlicensed doctors and anatomists of western history. They were abortionists, nurses and counsellors. They were pharmacists, cultivating healing herbs and exchanging the secrets of their uses. They were midwives, traveling from home to home and village to village. For centuries women were doctors without degrees, barred from books and lectures, learning from each other and passing on experience from neighbor to neighbor and mother to daughter. They were called “wise women” by the people, witches or charlatans by the authorities. Medicine is part of our heritage as women, our history, our birthright.”

Medicine women – primarily midwives – were persecuted mercilessly by the Medieval church that controlled medical education and practice on behalf of the ruling classes. This persecution lasted well into the so-called “Age of Reason” [14th through 17th centuries] and swept Europe before it again reared its ugly head in the American colonies with the famous witch-trials of Massachusetts.

The extent of the persecution is breathtaking. In the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries there were tens of thousands of executions – usually live burning at the stake – and some historians claim millions were eventually killed. 85-90 percent of those killed were women.

As the feudal and religious war against women healers waned in the 18th century, the rise of male-dominated allopathic medicine took place and the battle against midwives was taken over by the medical profession and its control of regulatory law. Beginning in 1896, the U.S. medical community embarked on well-documented, well-coordinated and well-financed campaign to eliminate the midwife from the practice of her own profession.

To pull this off doctors had to re-define pregnancy and childbirth as disease rather than normal reproduction not fundamentally dangerous to mother or child if properly managed. By the 1920s a shift from home birth to hospital births had taken place, and the death rates for both mothers and babies soared as a result of routine medical and surgical interventions in the birth process. To this day the United States ranks at the bottom of all industrialized nations in infant and maternal mortality rates.

Yet there is good news, even though the war against midwives continued unabated medically and legislatively through the last part of the 20th century. States are again licensing midwives to attend uncomplicated births at birthing centers and in homes, as the statistics have demonstrated that healthier mothers and babies result from treating the birthing process as a normal organic function rather than a dread disease.

Homebirth 101 offers a sobering look at those statistics, and how they compare with hospital outcomes of overly medicated, overly managed birth. The American Pregnancy Association offers a fine list of questions and answers relating to the decision to give birth at home, what conditions would indicate that hospital birth would be safer, and what to expect if one chooses to give birth at home.

The first home birth I attended was when my little sister gave birth to my niece in Florida in 1984. I couldn’t imagine how she’d get through it without painkillers, as it was her first baby and she had a history of ER visits once a month just for menstrual cramps ever since she was a teenager. Yet the OB who had partnered with the only licensed midwife in the northern part of the state was forced to pull out of his partnership by peer pressure, and it was too late for the pregnant women who had already paid for the service to get other doctors. They had no choice – it was ER births or home with the overworked midwife who no longer had a clinic.

Surprisingly to me, the labor and birth went without a hitch even though the midwife (who had attended three other births that day) didn’t show up until it was pretty much over. We’d done our Bradley classes and were well prepared to manage the entire process if we had to. My second home birth experience was when my elder daughter gave birth to #1 grandson in my baby sister’s guest bedroom. Different midwife, and baby sister is an R.N., there was a last minute complication (cord strangulation) that I am quite sure would have resulted in a dead baby if we’d been at a hospital. Our midwife handled it quickly and ably, and that grandson starts college next fall.

My pregnant younger daughter hasn’t informed me of her birthing decision yet, probably hasn’t entirely made up her mind. But if she wants to have Sunshine at home, I’ll certainly be there to help. And I won’t be too scared to know what to do. I can help with cleaning and food, I can help distract her from hard labor, I can keep the water boiling and can even catch that baby if Daddy passes out. I’ve attended 6 other home births since, they all worked out fine.

After all, I am a certifiable crone.

Links:

Is Homebirth for You?

Home Birth

The Fall of Midwives

The war on midwives (part 3)

Historians as Demonologists: The Myth of the Midwife-Witch

I talked a little bit about hospital birth in the last installment, so now it’s time to discuss another option – giving birth at an efficient, home-style “Birthing Center” attended by licensed midwives and with a physician or two as partners on call.

Again, it’s vitally important for a mother-to-be to receive frequent and committed prenatal care from a doctor or midwife trained to spot potential problems before they get too far along. It’s also important for expectant parents to commit themselves to a proven birth educational program, and I have recommended the one I am most familiar with – The Bradley System.

If the pregnancy is developing normally and the mother is healthy and fit and confident of what she wants for herself and her baby as far as a birthing experience goes, it’s time to do some research on birthing centers near home and make some appointments to tour facilities and question staff.

If the parents have already chosen a midwife or midwifery group to provide prenatal care, they no doubt already have a list of birthing centers where those midwives are associated. Maybe even met a doctor who partners with the center. If not, there are resources on the web to help with the search.

The Online Birth Center offers a large collection of articles related to all things of concern to expectant and new parents. There is educational information about midwifery so you can better evaluate those you meet, a careful evaluation of common herbs your midwife might suggest you take and how those may affect you and your baby, even some newsgroups and forums where you can connect with other expectant mothers and couples for friendship, advice and some sympathetic eyes.

The American Pregnancy Association offers a fine list of questions to ask when you’re visiting birthing centers in your area. This is very valuable information, such as what you should expect from any birthing center to even consider it for your own experience:

• A relaxed and warm setting.
• Liberty to return home shortly after birth if you wish.
• Health care providers that include nurse-midwives, direct-entry midwives and/or nurses working with a listed, board certified obstetrician.

And to this add the proximity to a hospital, either attached or affiliated, just in case. The site also offers links to educational material and articles about planning and preparing for birth, fetal development, multiples, labor and birth, health and safety issues, prenatal testing, complications and birth control options. A very good source of information and useful methodology for choosing just the right birthing center.

Finally, the American Association of Birth Centers offers a mission statement, a list of frequently asked questions, tips on finding an association center near you, a well-stocked library and bookstore, and lots of educational material.

Unless something goes wrong – and potential problems are not always apparent before labor begins – birthing centers have a good record of helping to improve the mortality statistics in this country over what they were when most births occurred in hospitals or at home unattended. The welcome presence and encouraged participation of family members in a home-like atmosphere makes the experience more pleasant for everyone involved, and one of the best things a mother can do to help ensure a healthy birth is to avoid drugs either to rush her labor or those to treat her pain that go straight into the baby’s system and depress normal responses at birth.

Birthing centers aren’t cheap, thus will not be an option for everyone. They are worth investigating as an option, and couples will feel much better all around about their choices if they’ve done the homework!

Links:

American Association of Birth Centers

Online Birth Center

American Pregnancy Association

In this and my next few posts I’ll be taking a look at some of the birthing options open to parents these days, along with statistical analysis of pros and cons for both mothers and infants. The first option is hospital birth.

To grandmothers (like me), it might seem odd to talk about hospital birth as an ‘option’, since back in ancient history when we were having our children, hospital births were the norm. Unless something strange happened – like giving birth in a taxi stuck in traffic, or in an elevator stuck between floors – almost everyone was born in a hospital.

It was the end result of decades’ worth of efforts by the medical profession to both ease the pain of childbirth for mothers with strong drugs and ’save’ the greatest number of babies from the detrimental effects of those drugs. Women in labor were isolated and strapped to gurneys on their backs with labor-enhancing drugs flowing into their bloodstream from IV tubes to counter the labor-retarding effects of painkillers. When the time came Mom was wheeled into a sterile OR called the ‘Delivery Room’, where her peritoneum was sliced open and the baby pulled out with giant metal tongs called forceps. Which often left serious bruises on the baby’s head or cheeks.

The baby was promptly whisked away to a separate ward by nurses who cleaned it up, administered various tests, and immediately instigated formula feeding. If Mom did well, she could see the baby once every 4 or 6 hours for 15 minutes, so long as she didn’t have any visitors at the time. Dads could see their babies through thick glass for an hour or two a day, but were not allowed anywhere near enough to ‘contaminate’ the child until 3 or 4 days later, when he got to take Mom and baby home.

It wasn’t much fun, and for some strange reason doctors and others directly involved in the process didn’t warn first time parents about this dehumanizing situation. Perhaps because if they had, more women would have gone looking for something better. Still, it was the normal cultural means of birthing, the country enjoyed steadily decreasing maternal and infant mortality statistics, and most people accepted the doctor-inspired diagnosis that pregnancy and childbirth are disease, to be treated as disease.

However, infant and maternal mortality rates have not declined since 1982, and dangers associated with caesarian sections mandated for the convenience of the physician and hospital-contracted infections threaten progress that has been made. The US still ranks 37th in the world in infant mortality, and maternal deaths among minority women are at the level of many third world countries.

Hospital births are also the most expensive option, effectively out of the question for the tens of millions of uninsured in this country who aren’t poor enough to qualify for Medicaid and not rich enough to pay out of pocket.

That said, the expectant couple should keep in mind that even if they make alternative choices – a birthing center with nurse-midwives in attendance or a home birth with a licensed lay midwife – it is always possible that they may end up at the hospital for their birthing experience. Complications in labor, delivery and post-delivery may arise, so good pre-natal care is essential to spot problems as early as possible.

Still, many hospitals these days do accommodate couples’ choices as much as possible. Birthing wings are often kept quite separate from areas of hospitals where the danger of transmitted infections is minimal. Some offer ample “birthing suites” where couples and their families can manage their own labors and delivery with the ready help of on-staff nurse-midwives. If something does go wrong, there’s no need for a frantic trip to the hospital, as doctors are in-house and the OR is right down the hall. For many first-time parents this can take a load of worry off their minds.

No matter what choices are made for birthing, the expectant couple should definitely be as educated as possible about all aspects of pregnancy and childbirth. I’ve been designated birthing partner for my sister, my elder daughter and two friends in the last couple of decades, and the best recommendation I could give to any expectant couple is to join a local Bradley Class. Honestly, by the time you’re done with the 12 week course, you’ll know enough to deliver that baby yourselves if you have to (or just want to), and you’ll feel very empowered by the knowledge.

Sunshine’s Mom (my daughter) is already enrolled, she and her husband began classes this week. While I do plan to be there when the baby is born, I’m practicing up on staying out of the way. That way I’ll be there if needed, can fill in if Daddy needs a break for awhile, and can remind Mom that she’s Queen of the Universe when she’s feeling most exhausted and frightened.

Next we’ll take a look at some of those birthing centers, and some of the more ’spiritual’ methods of birthing that have become increasingly popular in the last decade or so. We’ve months and months to go, so there’s plenty of time!

Links:

Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way

Midwifery Today: Is Hospital Birth Better>

WebMD Childbirth Options: What’s Best?

American College of Domiciliary Midwives: Analysis

My younger daughter and her husband visited this past weekend from Indianapolis. She’s into her 4th month of pregnancy (her first), just getting over the serious morning sickness phase, needed some Mom-time. Which I was of course delighted to lavish on her, sympathizing with her queazy stomach and re-arranging innards, happy to whip up some colorful stir-fry, hummus, falafel and tabouli for pita sandwiches, anything that sounded good, that she thought she might be able to keep down.

She’s never been a happy morning person, so when her hubby mentioned how hard the last few months have been – a strain on their relationship as well as their income since they work together out of home – I wasn’t very sympathetic. Grandpa could take care of that chore. And he did.

My hubby and I just celebrated our 38th anniversary earlier this month, but didn’t get to go to the lake house like we have ever since it got built because elder daughter blew the engine in her car, my car’s back end is about to walk out from underneath it, and that puts us down to a single pick’em up truck we’ve got to share. Ah, well. We’ve had worse anniversaries…

Anyway, I mention this because my husband – “Uncle Grandpa” to dozens and just plain “Grandpa” to a rising tide of others – is amazingly well trained. I was pregnant for 18 months out of our first 3 years of marriage, and was deathly ill for every minute of it. What my Son-in-Law was complaining about seems trivial compared to that, as well as compared to all the years since I decided to stop doing the pregnant thing. His marital philosophy is one that should be preserved and taught as classical wisdom, which seems to be in very short supply in these days of “for better and screw you if it gets worse” serial monogamy.

She Is Always Right, You Are Always Wrong.

Short, simple yet profound, endearing in the extreme. Growing, having and raising a baby isn’t an easy job, and the vast majority of the physical investment in that endeavor comes exclusively from the woman. That’s just how nature and/or God set things up, we should presume life and/or love set it up that way on purpose: it works, better than possible alternatives. For couples to get through the year it takes to grow, produce and nurture an infant to a good healthy start in life, it’s just best for the Dad to live this philosophy as much as possible, put aside his own juvenile tendencies and ‘all about me’ delusions.

I admit to being somewhat flummoxed by the underlying ‘wrong-ness’ of pair bonding these days, when half of marriages end in divorce before even five short years, kids grow up in multiple homes with multiple Moms and Dads and Temporaries (or none at all), and nobody seems willing to build relationships rather than simply toss inconvenient ones out with last year’s clothes. A year in the course of a lifetime is nothing, relatively speaking. To a mere temporary arrangement, it’s forever.

That’s a shame, but it’s what is real in the world my children are trying to negotiate, and the one my grandchildren will soon be trying to live with. At any rate, I got to baby my baby for a couple of days, Grandpa got to lend sage advice and an understanding ear to her choice of mate. That’s really about all we’re good for at this point.

Though we did spend hours and hours around the campfire, playing dice at the kitchen bar, sitting idly about the living room thinking up baby names. THAT is a fun pastime! I think we went all the way through the alphabet from Adam to Zelda and everything in between – including, of course, Elvis.

But it seems they’ve already settled on a girl name – Sunshine – that I’m hoping may reflect a happier morning person personality than her Mom ever managed. By the time they departed for home on Sunday afternoon, the guys had settled on two boy names I’m hoping will be overruled firmly when the baby is born (if it’s a he)…

GuitarGreg and CoolAssMojo (both as single first names). I voted for Elvis, so this is NOT my fault!

Links:

Baby Names, Name Origin and Meaning

Unique Baby Names, Meanings

In my last post I talked about how important it is for expectant young parents to spend time talking with each other about their own childhoods, and what they thought their parents had done right and wrong. The better to come to mutual agreement on some of the things they will and will not do for their children.

In this post let’s look at some of the positive commitments sociologists and psychologists consider to be important for children and families. The issues for younger children usually have to do with rules, discipline and the ‘balance of power’ in the home.

1. Make your rules as simple as possible.
The adult world is complicated, even for adults. Young children need not to be faced with blatant contradictions when they’re trying to learn how to function in the world, so keep things simple and direct. You’ll inevitably have occasional exceptions, but it’s best to save them for after the kids have learned what the rules are.

One of the most important rules for both children and parents I see most inconsistently applied – or not imposed at all – is a regular bedtime. As soon as babies get settled in enough to sleep through the night, they should be introduced to their bedtime. Depending on the sleeping arrangements and schedules of all concerned, of course, but parents have very good reasons for gently, lovingly but firmly imposing and enforcing this one consistently.

First, children are energy-sappers big time. They tend to wake up early in the morning, go strong all day long (naps are a good idea too!), and will stay up until they litterally fall on their faces if parents don’t insist on a regular bedtime. Parental exhaustion leads to problems in a home. So does a total lack of parental privacy and adult-time. These are very important for the couple and for the strength and happiness of their marriage. There’s enough unhappiness out there. Don’t let kids be responsible for more than their share of it!

I always got my kids to bed by 8:30 unless there was something important that interfered, and maintained that bedtime until they got to at least the 4th grade. At which point it was 9:00, then 9:30 when they got to adolescence. I impose that on my grandchildren too – with a smile and a kiss and a story and a tuck-in after bath and brushed teeth (this is a whole routine), even though some of my grandchildren don’t have regular bedtimes at home and never have had them.

Not amazingly, they don’t mind at all. In fact, they LIKE it! It gives them special, one-on-one time and attention, lets them know there’s plenty to do tomorrow and they should get busy having good dreams, and they aren’t nearly such a handful the next morning, either. Nothing worse than a kid who doesn’t get enough sleep.

It’s just Grandma’s way, and they do fine with it. Psychologists, researchers and educational specialists all report that children don’t get enough sleep these days, and that it’s a serious issue. It affects their behavior at home and in school. It affects their learning and their grades – not for the better. And it also affects their health. All of these should matter a great deal to parents, so don’t be wishy-washy about it. Have a bedtime, and stick with it. And whatever you do, don’t let television get in the way! Kids watch way too much of it, don’t let them get into a habit of late evening TV watching. It’ll make ‘em dull…

2. Give explanations for your rules.
I’ve offered good reasons for a regularly scheduled bedtime, easily explained to kids with “You need to sleep, it’s good for you,” and “We need our adult time, it’s kid’s time for bed.” Make it easy for other rules as well, such as picking up toys and dropped clothing, etc. Don’t just bark orders, tell them you don’t want to fall over their blocks, don’t want to lose their coats, something like that.

If you won’t allow your children to eat their meals in the living room in front of the TV, tell them you enjoy their company at the dining table and want to hear about their day. If you won’t let them watch television until their homework is done, tell them how smart they are, how proud you are of their accomplishments at school, and how much it means to you that they continue to do well. If you have reasons, you can likely find a way to explain it simply to your children. They’ll learn good reasoning skills, and you won’t have to fight (much) with them about it.

3. Be a good example.
Children don’t understand subtleties very well. Throwing a sponge ball across the room is the same to them as throwing a baseball, but that baseball is going to smash something. Don’t do something you’ve forbidden them. If they can’t throw baseballs in the house, don’t play catch with your spouse in the house. They may not understand subtleties, but they readily perceive hypocrisy!

4. Be consistent.
While rules will sometimes be bent or exempted due to unusual circumstances, your goal should be to teach your children that breaking rules will have consequences. These should of course not be too harsh, but they should be unpleasant enough that the child doesn’t want to face them on a regular basis.

Consequences should be imposed immediately so the child can easily make the connection between the rulebreaking and its result. If throwing that baseball (whether or not it breaks the Ming vase) means a 15-minute time out, put the child in the chair and explain the offense right now – before cleaning up the mess. And make him stay in that chair for the whole 15 minutes. You might even make an elaborate deal out of the clean-up if you think it will make the point. If nothing was broken make her stay in the chair for the full time out anyway, then go right back to whatever else you were doing.

Okay, that’s a good start! There is plenty of good advice out there related to these issues, so check some of the links below.

Links:

Planning: Rules and Routines

Parenting & Children: Rules for the Family

Congratulations! Whether you planned to have a baby right now or were just pleasantly surprised by the next generation knocking on your life-door, now is a very good time to sit down with your partner and openly discuss some of the issues you’ll face as parents. Doesn’t matter if you have just one child, or plan to raise a whole brood. The decisions you make now about your parental roles will affect everyone in the family for better or worse.

Having a baby is just the beginning. As I’ve warned my youngest daughter struggling through morning sickness with her first baby. Raising the child entails a lot of planning and work that new parents often neglect to do before the babies come along. Sure, you can learn by experience – what we used to call the “School of Hard Knocks” – but who really wants to make big mistakes along the way that their children may suffer from?

When we were young and facing parenthood, my husband and I spent many a long night just talking about our own childhoods, and the things we thought our parents did wrong. That’s actually the easy part. You can then come up with some statements about what you won’t do to your own children.

We didn’t like getting hit with weapons (like a belt, a paddle, or the back of a hairbrush), as if a full grow adult’s hand weren’t weapon enough to ‘knock some sense into’ a young child. Ix-nay on the physical beatings. We didn’t like not having our own separate identities, forever being lumped in with all the children when it came to punishments and rewards. So we promised ourselves we wouldn’t assume guilt or innocence equally among our children, and wouldn’t ever call any of them “Hey, You” (yes, there were a lot of kids in my family).

Each couple will bring resentments and fond memories of their childhood to their marriage. It is important to know these, and make a real effort to repeat what went right while avoiding the mistakes yourselves. But that doesn’t mean you won’t invent all new mistakes, so it’s also a good thing to extend a little forgiveness to your parents for their shortcomings. You’ll be in a position to want forgiveness from your children someday too!

After some months of this in-depth parental analysis, I printed our decisions in magic marker on a piece of parchment and framed it to hang on the wall. Where we kept it until the kids started school (and could read it for themselves – watch out for that, they’ll nail you on it).

Nor did we abide our decisions completely, all the time. It’s very easy to become overwhelmed by the stresses and strains of everyday life with children, and automatically fall into the patterns our parents set – they’re really all we DO know about parenting at the primal level. So despite my solemn oath never to hit my children, when they decided to play in the street one day and the screeching of tires barely missing them sent my heart somewhere down around my ankles, I did it.

I busted their little butts – over my knee, just like my Mom did for a similar infraction when I was maybe 3. Didn’t really hurt them (certainly not like that car could have hurt them!), but I felt bad and never did it again. Of course, it was so out of character that they never tried playing in the street again either. I count that as a good lesson learned. You can reason with ‘em all day on something like that and it’ll mean exactly squat if they decide to test your theories and end up dead or in ICU for months.

So take the time to have these discussions with your mate, and get some ideas about the directions you do and don’t want to go with your own children. There are of course many more issues that must be explored as your family begins to grow, and I’ll talk about some of those in later posts. Some of you will no doubt be happy to know that there’s a lot of research out there about these things – what children need, what parents need, what families need. So be sure and stay tuned!