Connected Mom

Moving As Motivation To Go Green

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 17 May 2012 08:20:00 +0000

We're going to be moving into a new home in a few weeks. I plan to use this transition as an opportunity for increasing my crunchiness, so to speak, and getting just a little bit greener.

We take small steps now. We reduce, reuse, and recycle. We use cloth diapers and wipes most of the time. We're careful about our water use and combine car trips/errands whenever possible. (And not just because I hate driving.) However, I know we can do better. My hope is that setting up a new home will motivate me to encourage simple, everyday changes with our housekeeping, eating, and self-care.

What I really want is for my children to see that this is just how we do things. I want taking care of the earth, eating healthy, and using earth-friendly products to be a natural part of their lives, not an abstract concept. My plan is to concentrate on just three areas and continue to make steady progress while involving my children in my thought process as much as possible. Following are a few minor changes I'm looking forward to trying.

Cleaning. My goal is no chemical cleaners. At all. I'm going to try some of the cleaning suggestions here (an article posted in Whole Living, a wealth of great information). This one has another motive as well: my six-year-old recently became fascinated with helping me around the house. I certainly would not hand her a commercial cleaner to use on her own, but I would totally ask her to polish the furniture with olive oil or scrub the sink with a lemon. Learning home economics and helping Momma. Score! I've also considered making my own laundry detergent, but with the amount we go through around here, I'm not sure I want to take that on. (But if anyone has suggestions, I'm open to them.)

Food. Imagine a brand new kitchen with not one crumb of food. Where do you start? What do you bring in? A while back I had this brilliant idea to eliminate food dyes as a first step in our food overhaul plan. I even found this fabulous site and went all crazy looking for "numbers" in everything we bought. Unfortunately we never really got any further than that. My new goal is to buy more produce locally. We go through a lot of fruit and veggies around here, so I figured this would be a good next step. (I've even found a farmers market that will deliver a basket of seasonal produce every week to my door, which sounds tempting. Hmm.)

Personal Care. While the idea of cleaning my kitchen with baking soda and a lemon seems totally do-able, when it comes to products I use on myself, eh . . . I'm iffy on whether or not I'm willing to craft, say, my own toothpaste. I also have no interest in going no poo, although I try to use as little as possible and I don't lather up every day. (But I did find this great post about going shampoo-free and must admit I find it slightly intriguing.) I am a bit giddy, however, about the opportunity to try out some more natural (albeit commercially available) products. I recently became a fan of Toms of Maine, and I'm especially thrilled that they have a children's toothpaste that does not contain the aforementioned nasty dyes.

Like I said, baby steps. I know I'm not going to wake up one day and transform into the model green living example. But, we have to start somewhere and I'm hoping to capitalize on the novelty of a new home in a new area to inspire me.

What small steps have you taken to help your family get greener?

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

Movement in Pregnancy

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:00:00 +0000

I look at pregnancy a little different than most. For me? Every single day is a miracle. On the days where I'm terrified and worried, every minute is a miracle. I may not connect or bond with my babies very early because of the fear, but for the two pregnancies I've had that went past 7 weeks since my daughter, I'm prepared and open for anything.

I don't agree with a lot of the big baby tracking apps and websites that you can subscribe to, but on my Kindle I downloaded the babycenter pregnancy app so my daughter could watch movies of our baby and see it grow. I also like the little fruit analogies so she can understand how big our baby is (even though right now our baby is measuring bigger than their fruits).

When I watched one of the videos with her, it talked about how baby is fluttering and moving all the time, but you won't feel this movement for a few more months. I may not be that far along, but my baby is two inches long. This baby isn't small anymore.

It got me thinking.

Is it truly impossible to feel a baby move before the common 12-18 weeks? Or is that something we've been telling women for years and they put off what they think they feel? Are we in essence, from the very beginning of a woman's pregnancy, basically telling her that what she is feeling is wrong, and having her doubt herself before she is even near giving birth??

With one of my pregnancies, I was on bedrest, so I couldn't be very active, and I felt that baby move very early. I was a few days before 11 weeks, and baby squirmed and wiggled like a goldfish in my lower belly. It was amazing. I had so many people tell me that was impossible, but so many more that talked about how they felt the same thing. I knew what I felt, and instead of letting people dissuade me from what I knew about my own body and my own baby, I stuck to it.

This time, even if I haven't bonded because of my history, this baby moved very early. Even earlier than my last "sticky" pregnancy. At almost the second trimester, this baby already moves around a lot.

To explain, movements this early aren't the same as movements you feel at 20 weeks. They are less kicks and bumps, and more pressure and slight wiggles. The first movements I felt were because I could feel my uterus go from far into my pelvis to poking out. If I hadn't known what I was looking for, and known how to figure out it was my uterus from early on, I would have just assumed it was cramps or gas.

Yes, it seems unlikely to be able to feel a baby wiggle and squirm when they are the size of a grape, but how is that in any way impossible? Impossible things happen every day. We shouldn't be telling pregnant women that their first connection to their baby is impossible. Plus, how would anyone but her know what she felt? Reading about it in textbooks, working with pregnant women, yes that can make you an expert in situations, but in the end, every woman is different, as is every baby and pregnancy.

I didn't feel my daughter move until 21 weeks. I had an anterior placenta so even when she did move, it wasn't much because the placenta blocked most of it, and she wasn't a very active baby. Does that mean I should believe it's impossible for anyone to feel a baby move before 21 weeks because that was my experience?

Pregnancy is the time where a woman should be getting to know her own body and her own baby. No one else should interfere in that process, even if it's about the impossibility of early movement. We should be helping women trust in their own experiences and their own feelings, not putting them down from the first instance.

Early movement is improbably but not impossible. Women should be able to trust their own intuition. And maybe if we believe them about the early experiences in pregnancy, their trust in what their bodies can do will follow.

Feminism and Attachment Parenting: It Can Work

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Tue, 15 May 2012 07:03:00 +0000

Twenty years ago, or maybe it's closer to fifteen, in any case, once upon what feels like a lifetime ago, an ex-boyfriend and I had an argument about whether a woman should stay home after having children. He argued that women should stay home, because it was better for the children; a mother could give children an emotional security that no one else could. I argued that it was sexist to say a woman “should” do anything, and that women should not be the ones to give up their career or work outside the home just because they happen to be the ones having children. A father or other trusted care giver could just as easily provide the love, care and emotional security children required.

In hindsight, the fight was stupid, simply because it was theoretical. We were still in college. We were too young to even be talking about the prospect of having children. Even when we were out of college, the topic of living together never came up. I never expected a proposal. Now I know enough to know it doesn't make sense to talk about scenarios that aren't real or on the soon-to-be-horizon. As they say, it's like worrying about problems that you don't even have yet.

But at the time, I was young and oversensitive, I took his views as a personal attack, as if he was saying, what I wanted for myself individually was less important than my potential child needs, as if he was suggesting that women (me) not just take off a few years or the first year of each child's life off from their careers, but give them up permanently, and to fail to do this, made them a bad mother. Whether he was actually saying this or not, I made the point that women who have something – like a career – that nurtures them, make better and far more nurturing mothers, in addition to demonstrating to their children of both genders that they can pursue and fulfill the careers of their dreams.

At the time, I thought anyone saying that women SHOULD stay home was sexist, and that anyone who suggested that a baby's needs were more important than a mother's was especially sexist, because such a view devalued women, their potential, their skills, and their lives. I thought for a mother to be a good respectable mother, she had to put herself first. That if she took care of herself, and enjoyed her life, it would only benefit her children, whereas an exhausted woman who gave everything, never got anything for herself, would only end up resenting her children and feeling like she was constantly being taken advantaged of. For the record, I do think some degree of this is true. And yes, I realize, in all fairness to my ex-boyfriend, he wasn't saying women are a dishrag who should be completely used up by their children.

At least I hope not. (Actually, what I hear from his mother, whom I am still friends with, is that he is a very loving, committed, hands on, and patient parent.)

I think I was all of nineteen when we had this fight. I don't know for sure, and I'm unwilling to go through old journals (because there are a lot – this ranting habit of mine is hardly new) to find the exact date. But it was the early 90s. I had read Naomi Wolf's The Beauty Myth and Carol Gilligan's Ina Different Voice. My copy of Susan Faludi's Backlash was dogeared, with a spine that was so cracked, I had to tape it back together. I subscribed to Ms. Magazine. Gloria Steinem and Hillary Rodham Clinton had told me I could have it all and that I was entitled to it. Poor ex-boyfriend, given all the reading I had been doing, it was just an argument waiting for an opportunity to assert itself.

When I became a mother a good decade and half later, I thought of this fight often. I found myself wondering what my 19 year old feminist self would say about my mothering self. When I was 19, I had wanted to teach college English. I wanted tenure. I wanted to write books that won the Pulitzer. By the time I got pregnant, I had taught college English, but I no longer wanted tenure. In fact, I walked off campus the last time before my husband's job took us to LA, and realized with a startlingly clarity that I never wanted to teach again. While I had written books, they hadn't won the Pulitzer because they hadn't been published (yet...). My husband and I moved to LA, and I sat my pregnant-bellied self in my new found spot at Ground Zero of My Life.

And when I gave birth to my son (Yes, naturally. My fear of needles is bigger than my fear of pain.) I, like many parents before me, melted. While I had some anxiety about mothering, simply because my own mother didn't seem to enjoy it much, it disappeared the second he was born. I was startled to discover a few weeks, and then a few months later, that I had never felt happier. Given that my son literally nursed every twenty minutes, it's entirely likely, I was just high on oxytocin, with fresh new hormones releasing every single time he latched. Nevertheless, he was an easy and happy baby, as long as he nursed. Which means, I was one of “those” women that Elisabeth Badinter writes about in The Conflict and that the latest issue of Time magazine points to, with its cover asking, "Are You Mom Enough?"

In my new motherhood, I was surprised how often I found myself questioning what my younger feminist self would say about my mothering self, and wondering if she felt like she had failed as a feminist, and if I could still even call myself one. I talked to myself a lot about this point. I even joked at mom's group and with other mothers that honestly, I have failed at everything and most of my ideal career choices in my life, breastfeeding is just the weird thing that came easily to me. It's just my bad luck that I can no longer make a living as a wet nurse. (And if I had known that this would be the one thing I was good at, maybe I should have pursued it earlier?). In the end though, I would end the conversation with myself by concluding that what I had been arguing for all along was that women have choices, and that those choices be equally valued and respected.

Consequently, what has come to be these ridiculous debates or battles or in more polite words, conversations, about Attachment Parenting and if it devalues women, has continued to hit nerve after nerve of mine. Badinter is hardly the first. Ayelet Waldmen makes a few jabs in Bad Mother. Judith Warner in Perfect Madness; Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety argues against the pressure to breastfeed for at least a year and the “boundary breakdown” of attachment parenting, and Lisa Bloom in Think takes a two paragraph time out from arguing against the dumbing down of American women to argue against co-sleeping, because she thinks sleeping next to one's child causes one to lose sleep.

No, actually. When you co-sleep, you roll over, nurse and go back to sleep (if you've woken up). When your baby is in a crib down the hall, you wake up, walk down the hall, sit in a rocking chair and nurse, then after your baby is back asleep, you walk back down the hall, go back to sleep, only to repeat the entire process two hours later. Because your sleep is so physically disrupted, you can't help but be exhausted.

See? Nerve. I try to rise above these weird assumptions about attachment parenting, and I keep taking the bait.

And all these books make valid points and are worth reading (while the Badinter reads quickly, you could probably still save the time and find a nice summary. It's not like it hasn't been written about ad nauseam.) Still, I can't help it. I want to shout at these women, “You know what devalues a woman and mother? FATIGUE!”

I understand - having thought similar thoughts as a 19 year old feminist – the concerns of these women and the people who feel compelled to turn attachment parenting into some weird thing it's not. It's easy to fear falling so head first into mothering that you risk losing yourself. It's happened to many an innocent woman before.

But I have to question the women who continue to point to certain choices women are making as mothers and asserting that those choices are causing them to be devalued as individuals. I have to question the notion of not keeping our children at arm's length makes us less feminist or equal. Because I don't actually think the issue is attachment parenting or any other form of parenting. Most parents of my current parenting generation are fairly clear that like many parents before us, there will be things we do as parents that work, and that there are things we do that don't work as well. All of us are making the best choices we can with what we have, and the choices we're making line up with our values, who we know ourselves to be, and who we know our children to be. We're all interested in doing what works for us, our children and our nightly sleep. There are more parenting resources than ever before in history. It's not like we're not doing our homework.

Rather, I think the issue is that motherhood isn't valued the way we'd like to think it is. It's easy to resent anyone who recommends breastfeeding at least a year because employers aren't set up to support mothers who breastfeed a year with paid maternal leave. Of course working women who resort to bottles and formula feel pressured to breastfeed: their doctors are recommending they do something they can't easily do. With work days getting longer, not shorter, it isn't exactly fun to stick your breasts into a machine inspired by efficiently milking commercial dairy cows while you think of your baby that you haven't seen in 10 hours. And not that breastfeeding mothers are off the pressure hook either, with breastfeeding rates at 30% after three months and 13%, I can't say I agree with Badinter that the “Tyranny of Breastfeeding” has accomplished its goal. Rather, a woman breastfeeding her child the recommended length, more often than not, is asked when she'll quit, why she hasn't quit, isn't it weird, and if not, when will it be? The tyranny of breastfeeding has hardly normalized what pediatricians around the world recommend for all children.

I do appreciate the conversations women are starting, because it's clear dissatisfaction is afoot. But instead of taking our dissatisfaction out on each other and various parenting choices, which are nobody else's business anyway, why not instead work towards something that will make parenting better for everyone? Because let's be honest, the current work culture doesn't make it easy for parents of either gender to be good parents, whether it's an utter lack of paid sick days and family and medical leave or a work environment that demands employees work at least 12 hours at a time, and look down on them if they don't.

I am tired of women being women's harshest critics. It's hardly new. Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Women was published in 1792. Her sharpest critics were women. The reasoning behind it is rather simple. As my midwife told me in my first pregnancy, I would never have to even utter a word about my parenting (or life) choices, because the sheer fact that I was doing it differently than someone else would have that someone else feel judged or threatened or like I thought they or their way wasn't good enough, when in reality, it has nothing to do with them at all. Surely, in addition to all the rights we've earned since 1792, we've also gained enough security in our selves and our choices that we can not take each other's approaches so personally?

Badinter and Time magazine seem to think not. I disagree.

When Life Gets in the Way of Living

noreply@blogger.com (Anastasia) — Thu, 10 May 2012 11:15:00 +0000

I had a relatively simple childhood. My days were spent playing on my own—in the warm months, creating magical gardens and befriending neighborhood cats, running amok in our backyard, playing with dirt; with sticks; collecting leaves and always promising myself that I’d dry them and keep them in a book (I never did). In the colder months, I spent my time imagining worlds for my Barbie dolls to live in, I read, and I played with my older sister.

There were no such things as dance classes, gymnastics, swimming, or karate for me. We never went on play dates, and my mom never had any other “mom friends” over. That said, I had a stress free, easy-going, blissful childhood. I never worried about being anywhere besides school—I never had a weekly schedule with anything on it other than homework. And I have no complaints.

Oh, how times have changed. As my kids get older and more active, I find myself trying to come up with ways to occupy their time. Don’t get me wrong—we have plenty of fun on our own. But, there are only so many ways we can dress up, only so many books we can read, puzzles we can make, crafts we can create, cupcakes and cookies we can bake; canvases we can paint; play dough we can concoct. We watch TV, but I dislike simply sticking my kids in front of it for the duration of the cold months; and they, and I, need social interaction.

So, we take classes. Lots and lots of classes. Art, guitar, and baseball for my son; dance, animal/nature, art and piano for my daughter. I swore I would never become one of those “We have to go to _____ class today” moms, but I have (oh, and by the way, I could write a book listing all the things I said I or my kids would “never” do).

My husband and I agreed that if any of our kids showed an interest or any affinity for something, we would jump right on it and encourage them in every way possible. We’ve stuck to that, and I’m so happy and grateful that we’ve been able to hone in on my son’s interests and have figured out what makes him “tick” to some extent. He is so happy with art and music; and his dad is coaching him in baseball, which is such an amazing opportunity for the two of them. My daughter is pretty easygoing when it comes to activities, but her interests are clear and she absolutely adores being out and about and enjoys each of her classes. We’ve tried out activities that have turned out to be duds now and again, but I definitely feel that each instance has taught us something.

I do, however, find this way of life somewhat challenging—more accurately, I find keeping the balance between work and play to be a constant worry, and something I have to be acutely conscious of. Being this busy is a slippery slope, and one can quickly forget to stop and smell the roses, watch the leaves turn, watch the snow fall. To take pleasure in simply being—in each day, in each breath. To not let life get in the way of living.

Do I want the type of life where I drive my minivan frantically from place to place, dropping off one kid here and one there? There will come a time when my kids’ day is structured and scheduled to the hour. There will be days when they want to play but will have to do homework instead (in fact, as the weather gets warmer, those days are rapidly approaching). There will be a day when, no matter how much my son loves Little League, he will want to sleep in instead of waking up for 7 a.m. practice on a Saturday. There are days already when my daughter wakes up grumpy, yet we still drag ourselves to music class because we’ve committed to it.

A few months ago I lightened the load of responsibilities that were causing me stress and anxiety but were bringing me little, if any, pleasure. I re-evaluated much of what I was doing with my family and decided we had to get rid of whatever was not making us truly happy. I enjoy being engaged and active in my life; but as they say, life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans—and I don’t want to let mine pass me by.

If living my life is causing me grief, if the day-to-day activities with my children stress me out to the point where I lose my mind, don’t I need to step back and re-evaluate? And do I really want my kids harried and stressed out over missing a class, a playdate, or being late? My sweetest daydreams of spending time with my family include cozy mornings making waffles; hot cocoa by the tree on Christmas day; stopping to jump into a pile of fall leaves while walking through the park; playing catch with the dog; sleeping in; and not doing anything at all.

And yet, I also see myself being buried under sports/music/art equipment. We do schedule activities and go to games, recitals, and exhibitions—and they are a joy. I do see my kids in sports uniforms, holding clarinets, covered in paint. I want our children to do what they love, and love what they do. I them to feel happy, safe, and secure, and know that their home is their haven, the place they can always come back to. I also want them to cultivate their interests, live a full life, and make the most of each day.

Nowhere in my daydreams do I see myself running ragged for anything; being so stressed out over the amount of items on my calendar that I lose my mind. However, despite my best intentions, I do run ragged, run late, and feel like a hamster in a wheel at times. Those are the times that I have taught myself to step back, breathe deep, and evaluate. Whatever is not truly important gets purged.

What difference does it make if my calendar is full but I’m so busy I don’t know what day of the week it is? And if I fill the little boxes in with constant activities, where is the space for fun, for exploration, for time just spent together? What’s the point of “getting everything done” if I’ve lost my temper and yelled at my kids and my spouse?

Years ago, I used to look at my life from the outside—like a picture, I wanted it to look perfect, pretty, and well organized. Now, I remind myself to live my life on the inside—realizing that the picture many not always look perfect, but knowing that what I fill the blanks in with is important.

So far, my boxes are full of the things we enjoy, while leaving space for us to breathe, have fun, and simply live. And I’ve discovered that what may look empty from the outside is more fulfilling than any pretty picture.

Life, Love and the Importance of Lactation Consultants

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 09 May 2012 16:01:00 +0000

On the heels of the Whoopi Goldberg comments regarding the breastfeeding initiative, I felt compelled to share my birth story. I’m sure there were plenty of other problems that could’ve occurred, but to us at the time, it felt like just about everything that could’ve gone wrong did, indeed, go wrong. I was quite resolved to nurse my daughter from the start, but those days in the hospital were far more trying than I anticipated. Were it not for the support of the amazing lactation consultants at our hospital, I’m not sure we would’ve succeeded.

After 6 hours of contractions 2-3 minutes apart (from midnight to 6am) we went in to the hospital with our awesome doula. I was completely heartbroken to find that I was only one centimeter! They quickly determined that my uterus was in spasm, which meant that between the highs of the contractions, it was never fully relaxing. So every time I moved the slightest bit I'd have a mini or full contraction. I couldn't even get to and from the bathroom without 2 extra contractions. So nobody could massage me, I couldn't move and I stayed frozen and tense for the majority of my labor because of it. I remember yelling at my husband in a panic when he caressed my arm because I thought it was going to bring on a contraction. Because I was so tense they gave me a sedative at about 7am. It knocked me out but not for the contractions. So I'd be completely passed out, and every 1-2 minutes wake up screaming and clutching the bed rails, and promptly pass back out. It was the weirdest, almost nightmare dreamlike state ever. By noon I was maybe 2 cm, and I pretty much threw in the towel on my natural labor. I think I may have hung in there if I had been progressing and knew there was a light at the end of the tunnel becoming even remotely visible, but 12 hours of contractions 1-3 minutes apart (and more hours prior) was wearing me out with no progression, so I caved. Not to mention the fact that my spasming uterus was basically keeping me locked up like a popsicle and threw that entire labor I’d envisioned of using the hospital birthing tub, walking around, etc...out the window. I’m sure plenty of you 30 and 40+ hour labor moms would probably laugh at that, but in the moment that’s where I was at – I needed some actual down time where I wasn’t tensed up thinking I couldn’t move for fear of the impending contraction that movement would cause.

From the moment our doula called the doctor, he was unfriendly to her and refused to speak to her even though I was in the middle of a contraction when she called. This behavior continued once we arrived, but he was gone by 7am and replaced by a much more considerate doctor. The nurse, however, had an equally frigid attitude towards our doula. Fortunately, at 11am she left her shift early and we were switched to the most wonderful nurse who was there for me until 11pm. But the first nurse would practically roll her eyes when I asked to turn over, because it meant she had to reposition the heart monitor. Amidst my weird sedated state, I would only ask about once every hour and a half if I could roll over to the other side because she made me feel bad about it.

So we arrived at 6am, epidural and pitocin started at noon, and by 4pm the downward spiral began. I got a fever, and my daughter’s heart rate was elevated. I had also passed meconium earlier and was Group B Strep positive, so the clock was ticking. They tried to give me something to bring my fever down, and said they'd give the baby some time to get her heart rate down. Nothing was working. The other main thing was we went in engaged at -1 with her in the perfect position, and then my daughter actually started to move BACKWARDS throughout labor. Before they cut me open you could see her curled up in a ball just beneath my rib cage. I didn't even know this was possible!

By the time the doctors switched at 7pm the new doc came in and was unbelievably pissed that nobody had called it and cut me open yet. At that point he insisted to do so, and when I told him I needed to talk it over with my doula and my husband, he stormed out in a fury. The nurse came back and said that he said if I didn't agree he was calling his lawyer. It was all very upsetting but we could kind of see it coming. My doula was getting uneasy about the snowballing problems, and ultimately, the main deciding factor was that my daughter was simply not coming out but actually moving backwards, and I was not progressing. But I wasn't progressing even before I got the epidural so I don't necessarily think that was it. Even my doula insisted that there was no other option.

Within 10 minutes of OK'ing the c-section I was being strapped to a table with my arms tied down like jesus on the cross. It was at this point they informed me (after telling me otherwise) that this same doctor wanted to cover his butt and because I had a fever they feared the baby might have an infection, so she'd be staying across the hospital in NICU for 2 days. Everything I'd hoped for went down the crapper in those 10 minutes. I tried to stop crying about it all and waited to see my daughter. I remember my husband having to wipe my running nose and tears because my arms were tied down.

They took her out and it was decided my husband would go with her. I am so thankful that our doula had sweet talked the nurses and docs into letting her come in when he left. She was able to stay with me for the majority of the surgery while they put me back together, and she also stayed with me in recovery. I don't know what I would've done if I was there alone because I was there for over 3 hours in a windowless room with no baby, no husband and just a nurse going in and out late at night after a LOOOOOONG day.

They also convinced our nurse to let me see my daughter that night (beyond the 60 seconds I got to see her after they took her out when they held her up to my face on the table). They told the nurse how long we tried to conceive and how many painful years I'd been waiting for this baby, and even though the doctors wanted us separated so I didn't infect her with my supposed infection (my temperature immediately returned to normal after the surgery!) she agreed. The nurse brought her down to me in recovery and I got to hold her for 10 minutes, but 10 minutes only. She slept soundly the whole time.

The next morning I was on an epidural and couldn't leave my bed, and my daughter was across the hospital in NICU. I kept harassing the nurse to get me off the epidural so I could go see her. My husband was bringing video of her back to me in my bed, and it was difficult keeping grandparents away until I got to see my baby.

By noon I was finally able to get into a wheelchair to see her, after incessantly pestering the worst nurse ever. Later, this same nurse returned to tend to my beeping machine a few hours after taking me to the bathroom for the first time after the epidural. I told her I was relieved because I needed to pee again. She replied, “You don’t need to buzz me for help if you have to pee, that was just for the first time.” So at less than 18 hours post c-section, she told me this and stood there and watched as I struggled like a turtle on my back trying to get out of bed, and continued to watch me hobble over to the bathroom and go by myself.

When this nurse finally got everything in place so I could be removed from my epidural and do all the things I needed to see my daughter, I got wheeled a long distance across the hospital. Obviously they were giving her formula, but they were very supportive of my breastfeeding. I was so doped up on percocet I could barely keep my eyes open, and people had to practically help me hold her the first time I got to really meet her. I still cry when I look at how out of it I was in those pictures. The first time I nursed her was behind a screen in NICU, with the stiffest hospital pillow on my lap, and it was really difficult to position her and lean forward with the c-section.

When I went back to my room I kept trying to pump and was completely unsuccessful. Not a single drop would come. They say you need a baby for the hormonal response, so in desperation I put on the newborn channel on the hospital TV in some pathetic attempt to get a response. My husband spent the majority of those first two days with our daughter, which was what we both wanted. I had seen several lactation consultants at this point who showed me how to use the pump and watched me nurse, but FINALLY one came in on the second day and got me bigger flanges for the pump so my nipple wasn't rubbing against the edges when it pulled in and out, and...SUCCESS! I remember shuffling out to the nurse’s station with my measly ounce of milk and being so proud! If it weren’t for the help of that LC, I’m not sure if I had it in me to keep trying to pump without my baby there - especially when it was hurting so much because the flanges were too small.

After the first meeting I would deliberately NOT take my pain pills when I knew I was going to see my daughter, but it made holding her and trying to nurse her excruciating. I had dreamt of this being such a beautiful experience for us, and there I was under fluorescent lights with a stranger’s family on the other side of the screen, grimacing while I tried to sit in an uncomfortable chair with that damn stiff, awkward pillow on my lap nursing her. At least she had an excellent latch. The lactation consultants were phenomenal and checked on me often and came with me to the NICU multiple times to help. They were so supportive, and I can remember one coming into my room first thing when she arrived for her shift, because she wanted to see how I was doing right away after meeting me the day before. She said she’d thought of me often overnight and hoped we were doing well. She encouraged my husband and I to do as much skin to skin contact as possible with our daughter, and she was so pleased to see that despite our rough start being across the hospital from one another, I was still trying.

When they finally gave her to us in our room after those first 48 hours, they said she was getting jaundiced and we had to overfeed her. At this point, as first time parents hearing threats of taking her away to go under the lights, we were willing to do just about anything they said and didn’t give it a second thought. We had her pounding formula and nursing ‘round the clock. Less than 12 hours after she was in our room with us, they said she didn't look good and suspected that the results of the blood test they just took were going to be bad and she'd have to stay under the lights and not in our room. They said they’d probably be back in a few minutes to take her away as soon as the test results came back, and that she probably wouldn't be going home with us if it was as they suspected. I instantaneously lost it and was in complete hysterics until 20 minutes later when they came back and said she just squeaked by on her blood test! They had just given her to me and they were going to take her away again? And factor in postpartum hormones? HOLY! Thankfully everything went OK from that point on until our release from the arctic hospital, into a 105 degree summer day.

I still can't really tell the story verbally to anyone without crying, and every time I see that triumphant moment in a movie where the baby is handed to the mom to nurse it I get choked up. To this day, I haven’t been able to get through reading “On the Day You Were Born” without sobbing. I think it would've been a lot easier to swallow if she had been in my room waiting for me after recovery and we could've gone from there. In the months that followed people asked about my “giving birth,” and I never felt like I gave birth to her. I felt like they took her from me, in more ways than one. I guess I still feel that hesitation whenever “giving birth” to her comes up, because it feels misleading.

But despite it all, despite spending those first few weeks home lamenting about the bonding we missed that I had played out in my head over and over....a friend of mine who is an amazing midwife said it best – “Birth is about separation, not bonding. It is probably the most literal example of separation. You have a lifetime to bond, and you and your baby are already connected.”

She was right. Upon returning home, we nursed exclusively for the first 7 months, and continue to do so today. We have shared a bed every night, and at nearly two years old, I still wear her occasionally, despite her enormous size. Others may have their own means of bonding, but for me those things helped tremendously. I can proudly assert that everyone who meets her says she is the happiest baby/toddler they've ever seen, and not the traumatized little baby I anticipated because of our separation at birth. We are so, so close, and yet, she is independent as can be and often running away from me down the street! She is a social butterfly at parties and could care less if I’m around in those situations. Yes, that rocky start is painful to think about, but in the long run, it sounds crazy to say but it didn't really matter. What mattered was things like the lasting relationship the LC's helped me establish, not the separation. No matter what type of birth you have, that love and intimacy can still be cultivated, even if you are denied it immediately following the birth. She’s happy as can be, and we have an undeniable bond…and we always will.

Thank you for taking the time to read my story!

What I Want For Mother's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 07 May 2012 21:56:00 +0000

Two weeks ago, my sister asked this season's first, “what do you want for Mother's Day?”

Mother's Day is a big business. Greeting cards, brunches, champagne toasts, jewelry, spa treatments, flowers, mugs from the paint-your-own-pottery place. The intention is valid, even admirable: to honor mothers and the work they do raising children.

Except this year, when my sister asked what I might want for Mother's Day, I did not think of the potential flower arrangements, necklaces with children's birth stones, or sappy greeting cards that were supposed to honor the hours and attention I give to my children. It's counter-intuitive, really, given that raising children can be exhaustive work with only emotional fulfillment as its reward. But raising my children is not what I recently find so exhausting.

No, what I recently find exhausting and what I thought of instead of the potential gifts I might reap is that in 45 states, 944 provisions have been introduced that would limit women's reproductive health and rights. I thought of how Arizona, now declares by law that pregnancy begins up to two weeks before conception - “from the first day of the last menstrual period of the pregnant woman.” So for Arizona, life begins before an egg is even fertilized, which by extension then means every woman in Arizona is pregnant the first two weeks of her monthly cycle. This is purely to limit abortion rights, but it just made the Sex Education taught in the public schools that much more confusing. No matter though, because while the most effective way to reduce teen pregnancy and abortion is through education in the public schools, several states introduced bills that would forbid anything but abstinence education or stipulate that certain “facts” must be taught, even if these “facts” aren't facts at all or have any medical or scientific basis. Abstinence education, as we know, is very good at telling women not to get pregnant by not having sex or to protect themselves from getting sexually abused or raped. It's also good for perpetuating sexist and traditional gender roles since when an unplanned pregnancy happens, it's the woman's life it impacts or education that gets derailed. It's lousy for educating or empowering men to take responsibility for themselves in preventing rapes, sex abuses, or unwanted pregnancies.

In Wisconsin, Gov. Walker repealed the comprehensive sex education laws only to replace it with an abstinence only one. He signed legislation to restrict abortion rights in health care exchanges and require doctors to “investigate women” seeking abortions to make sure they aren't being coerced (because it's such a big decision – surely a woman can't work this one out by herself). Then Walked signed a bill to nullify enforcement of the federal Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay for Women Act. So he may want women to have children, but he doesn't want to help them support the children his laws encourage.

I also thought of how many friends I have that since becoming mothers, they were passed over for promotions and raises – all because of the perception, that because of their family life, they would be less “available” or “committed” or “reliable” or “serious” at work, even though all solid evidence points to the contrary. Or the women who receive inadequate maternal leaves, so they go back to work after two or six weeks, as if they were out for a root canal rather than the act of having a baby. I thought of how women, on average, make 77 cents for each dollar that men make and that number drops to 73 if a woman is a mother. If that mother is single, the number drops further to 60 cents. Mothers are also 79% less likely to be hired compared to non-mothers with the same education and experience. Given that having a baby is one of the leading causes of a poverty spell for a family in this country, it seems we might want to point our attention to empowering women to provide for the families politicians think they should be having.

Then I thought of how every 90 seconds, or in other words, 1,000 women a day, die from a pregnancy related death. 90% of these are preventable and 50% of these happen in the first 48 hours after delivery. The US ranks 50^th in the world for maternal health.

The US also spends 30 cents of every dollar on the military, while only 4 cents goes towards education. So while the US has figured out how to monetize the killing of people, and even the incarcerating of people, we haven't figured out how to monetize the raising and education of people, and therefore, it falls to the bottom of the financial priority list.

I could go on about the recent injustices aimed at mothers and women, but I don't know that I need to. You get the idea, and that there's enough for me to say that to live in a country so actively limiting the rights of women and mothers on an almost daily basis – to such extent of 944 provisions in the first three months of 2012 alone – that Mother's Day feels like a cheap-drug-store-bought consolation prize of an acknowledgment.

A champagne toast brunch is a tempting way to spend a May Sunday morning; a boat ride on the lake in Central Park is an exquisitely tempting way to spend a morning having my parenting energies acknowledged. But I don't want it, because it's meaningless in a culture that doesn't put its attention and money where its mouth is.

No, what I want for Mother's Day is to live in a culture that values women and mothers and empowers them to be the best mothers they can be, and that means empowering them to decide for themselves when and how to give birth and how best to provide for their families, instead of leaving it up to a bunch of white guys to decide for them. Until then, I have no interest in a holiday that essentially is a band-aid for the rest of the year.

Girls Rule, Boys Too!

noreply@blogger.com (Mandi Spencer) — Fri, 04 May 2012 21:14:00 +0000

Cute banter or damaging stereotype?

Motherhood is rough, and it can be especially rough when we feel like our partners "don't get it." If we fail to communicate and work through our differences, it can lead to frustration or even resentment in a relationship. To relieve the tension, sometimes we might poke fun at men. I admit it, I have laughed at man-bashing humor before. I may have even passed along a joke or two. But when does it cross the line from being good-natured humor to enforcing a harmful stereotype?

Watching my third little boy sleeping sweetly in my arms, I begin to feel guilty about taking part in this. Little boys will one day grow into men. What will we raise them to believe about themselves? I don't mean to attack anyone who has ever laughed at a man joke. Nor do I feel women are free from sexism. I just want to urge you to pay attention to the messages we are sending our sons (and our daughters) when we degrade men.

Often, I hear women commiserating about their husbands. They will accuse them of being immature, insensitive, lazy, or clueless. These criticisms are commonly dismissed as "typical male behavior." I have done this myself, and (I am ashamed to admit) in the not-so-distant past. I can see two real problems with this type of thinking. First, not all men are like this. Do jerks exist? Sure! But it is unfair to demonize the many loving, attentive partners and fathers because of a few jerks. Second, it can become an excuse for legitimate jerks to behave disrespectfully--and for women to excuse it because "it's a man thing."

Sweet and innocent. Let's keep him that way.

I am especially concerned with using this language around our children. If boys hear enough of these stereotypes, they might start to believe them. They might come to feel that they are no better than that. Or they may give up trying to act with character, since they are going to be perceived negatively anyway. Our boys deserve better.

This doesn't just affect boys, either. Your daughter could grow up and enter a relationship with a man. Do you want to see her in a relationship with someone who believes that he is no better than those stereotypes? Do you want her to excuse someone who disrespects her because she believes all men are that way?

Instead of stereotypes, boys need role models. If you have a great guy in your life--a partner, a dad, a friend--show him you appreciate him. Show him openly so your son can see it. Let your son see you give respect to and receive respect from men. Most of all, respect your son. Let him explore all of his emotions, including the scary or tender ones. Love him unconditionally, hold him close, and give him space when he needs it. This way, he will learn empathy that will turn all of those negative perceptions on their heads!

Intentionally Simple

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 03 May 2012 11:43:00 +0000

At the beginning of the year I stumbled upon this website and came up with my own word for 2012: Intentional. For January I focused on becoming intentional with my time and for February I focused on becoming intentional with my words.

Then I . . . kind of forgot about it. March and April came and went in a blur. My best intentions (ahem) fell by the wayside.

For the month of May I'm making a renewed commitment to this whole idea of intentionality and my focus is on simplifying. (Perhaps that should have been my word all along?)

Because you know what happens when I forget to simplify?

I get grumpy, and start to spiral, and have a terrible time pulling out of my funk. (You know how it is when everything. just. seems. overwhelming. Yes, that.)
I yell at the Agents. I hate this most of all. I don't want to do it, I just do. And then I need something like this to get back on track again.
I stop taking care of myself . . . I don't sleep well, I don't get enough time alone, and I literally make myself ill. (Seriously. This week I came down with my first UTI in probably 15-20 years. Apologies for the TMI, but I seriously forgot how truly awful a urinary tract infection is. Ugh.)

I read somewhere recently that stress is what happens when you try to do two things at once. (I don't remember where or I would totally give credit. I'm nice like that.) Anyway, yes, that is me. I mean, to some extent if I couldn't multitask at least a little I could not survive life with three small children. However, I find that often I bring on the stress of tackling two (or three, or four) things at once myself. I don't need to be busy for the sake of being busy. And the thing is, even when I feel busy and productive I'm not necessarily getting more done, I'm just spinning faster.

Basically, I got caught up with trying to do too much, ended up getting nothing accomplished in the process, and now I want a do-over.

Okay, perhaps do over is not completely accurate. What I really need is an action plan. I've been so bogged down with, well, existing, that I haven't really stopped to assess in a long time.

So, what's a Momma to do?

I think what I'm really looking for is a better routine. As much as I enjoy our adventures with homeschooling, the past eight months of not "needing" to be anywhere in the mornings have taken a toll on our days. Yes, I like to be flexible, and it's nice to not always need to conform to an outside schedule. But . . . I think we've swung to far in the other direction.

On some level I wish I were one of those people who can go with the flow and remain calm and zen and all that, but the truth is I really like a good schedule to follow. While it may sound counterintuitive to some, I believe having more structure actually simplifies my days. I like knowing what to expect. I like a good list of this happens, then this happens. I like the repetitive feel of a well-planned week. We've been all over the map lately, with everything from bed time to meals to outside activities, and it's starting to show. I believe we will all benefit if Momma gets her act together and encourages a regular, simple routine.

For now, I'm going to try to make more of a conscious effort to focus on a few specific events to anchor our days. Of course we're in the middle of getting ready to move across an ocean so maybe now is not the best time to revamp the way we do things. And then we'll be off visiting relatives, and setting up the new house, and then we have a planned trip to see Mickey Mouse, and after that Hubby will be getting ready to leave . . .

Okay maybe this will be more challenging than I think.

Do you aim for simplicity, or do you thrive on chaos? What does your daily routine look like? What do you do to get back on track when you are feeling off kilter?

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

Fussybutt Moonbows Giveaway Winners!

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Thu, 03 May 2012 03:34:00 +0000

The winners have been emailed: Serena (#73) you are the winner of the 10" regular pad and Dawn (#208) you are the winner of the 7" liner!

Congrats to the winners and thank you all so much for participating!

The Frustrated Mom

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:28:00 +0000

A year ago this April, Lashanda Armstrong loaded her four children into her minivan and drove into the Hudson River. Her oldest son, aged 10, was the only survivor after he rolled down his window and swam to the boat ramp in 45 degree water. Her other children, ages, 5, 2, and 11 months all died.

By all accounts, Armstrong was a good mother doing the best she could on limited means and with limited emotional support. She was estranged from both of the fathers of her children and for all intents and purposes a single parent. She mentioned in passing to her children’s daycare provider that she was “tired and all alone.” After a fight with the father of her younger 3 children, it seems she felt even more so as that was when she piled all of her kids into the car and drove them down a boat ramp into the Hudson River.

Armstrong’s story is tragic, and still, when the topic came up in parent discussions on playgrounds or over dinner, parents talked about it in that distancing fashion that we save only for the most uncomfortable of topics. By the distancing fashion, I mean, the “I can’t imagine doing such a thing” or “Who could do such a thing?” or “It’s unnatural. It’s irrational – the urge to kill yourself and your children.” (as if we were unclear or thought that suicide and infanticide were well reasoned, thought out and rational courses of action). It’s the judgmental distancing thing we do when we’d like to think that the kinds of people who do these kinds of things are a completely different species of human being than ourselves.

I saw this again this last week, when a Chicago mom, Michelle Feliciano, 23, was arrested on child endangerment charges after her 11 month old baby was found with multiple injuries including bleeding on the brain, a broken clavicle, marks on the neck, and puncture wounds on his feet from toothpicks. Feliciano explained the injuries; she said they happened in a “bout of frustration.” Her oldest child, between the ages of three and four, is now staying with a relative, while her baby is in stable condition in the hospital.

The comments on Feliciano’s debut into the papers sound like the things I remember reading about in the history of the Salem Witch trials or a Dickens novel. Feliciano is an immoral monster who should be hung in the town square. She should be sterilized without her consent or anesthetic. Her crimes inspire even the most collected and enlightened of onlookers to think of the most barbaric and medieval of punishments.

Yet, Feliciano’s case, while profoundly disturbing, I think deserves some degree of compassion. She is another young mom trying to raise children on limited means. There is no mention of a father being present. While Feliciano had family close by and it was a family member who noticed that something was wrong when the 11-month old baby couldn’t hold his head up, Feliciano obviously didn’t feel like she could call them for help when she found herself frustrated. In the moment, dealing with two children all by herself seemed so overwhelming, that somehow hurting one of them seemed to make sense.

Child abuse is inexcusable, period. But to assume that Armstrong or Feliciano are unlike other people is a mistake. Rather, they reveal the shortcomings of all of us.

Parenting, as one of my friends says, is unrelenting. Consequently, it can bring out anger and frustration that most of us didn’t know we had. Despite being raised in an angry household where my parents often yelled (generally at each other), I didn’t consider myself an angry person. I didn’t usually yell or throw things or kick things or throw tantrums like people who were angry people did. Even when I had a child I didn’t do these things. When I had my first child, if anything, my patience, compassion, and tolerance increased. But something happened after the birth of my second. Since the birth of my daughter, and the increasing independence of my son who is 3-going-on-15, I have found myself profoundly and ridiculously angry. By sheer coincidence, I have also found myself profoundly and ridiculously tired.

And, I beat myself up all the more because my children are happy, easy to be around, healthy little people. Unlike Feliciano and Armstrong, I am educated and not young (and not there’s anything wrong with young parents, though studies show child abuse drops as people have children later in life, but to be clear, to have more than one child by 25 – the age when our own brain just finishes its development – is young) and I am not trying to raise my children on limited means. My children’s father is an active partner and parent; we have a solid marriage with pretty great communication skills. We fight and yell, but we also love and laugh and keep talking. My sister lives around the corner with her awesome soon-to-be husband. When my husband works late, I can crash – with my two kids in tow - dinner at their house. Yesterday, I came home to find my almost brother-in-law in the backyard working on our chicken coop and watching my son play; my husband had to run out for a work call. I also have help; we can afford a housecleaner and I have a nanny part-time, so while I get up insanely early to get work done, I also have a few hours in the afternoon when she comes. I have her help for whatever I need: she can hold the baby, while I hold my son during his allergy tests at the doctor’s office or his teeth cleaning at the dentist.

For all intents and purposes, my parenting experience is at the complete opposite end of the spectrum from Feliciano and Armstrong. Nonetheless, I have had days since the birth of my daughter, where I felt emotionally and physically exhausted, drained, isolated, angry and even violently so. I have had moments where I have imagined doing terrible things to my children and myself and horrified myself. I have had moments where I didn’t know I was going to make it through the end of the day. I have moments where when someone said, “it only gets worse” I have thought, “well, then, I am not going to make it.” I have had moments where walking into traffic seemed like a reasonable course of action. I have thought there was something terribly wrong with me. I have felt hopeless; because my own parents were so angry, I have spent years working on my personal development, so I didn’t follow in their marriage and child-rearing footsteps. And as a result, I do live a very different life than my parents did when they were my age.

Then one day, my son asked for sliced cheese and when I gave it to him, he cried that he didn’t want it and without even thinking, I became my mother in 1976 and picked up the cheese and threw it across the room and into the trash and said, “well, then don’t eat it.” Horrified by the instantaneous transformation, I instantly picked him up, apologized and we cried together about how I scared both of us.

When I tentatively brought up the topic of my own parenting anger in a group of friends and my favorite fellow parents, I was worried I would get asked to leave. But nonetheless, I had to ask, “I know we all want to be gentle parents, or conscious parents or whatever the terms are - I know we all want to be the parents our parents weren’t, but does anyone beside me ever just lose it?”

I wasn’t shunned. One friend said, it’s going to happen, and it’s what you do in the moments after that make the difference. I realized that this is true, that my own parents told me I had it coming, so I always felt wrong even if I wasn’t. Whereas my children and I ended our bad patches, with me apologizing, and us on the couch snuggled together and reading, that this had the effect of my outbursts passing like my kids’ outbursts. Once we expressed the emotions and accounted for them, we could move on without carrying grudges forward.

Another friend wisely said, “I think we have to be like Gandhi, where we just keep taking hits from the British.” Then she added, “But I don’t know that Gandhi was as tired as we are.”

So while I’d like to pretend I can’t fathom how people like Armstrong or Feliciano do what they did, I can; I have felt the emotions that lead to those kind of actions. And like them, and like my favorite friends, and like my wise-Gandhi-citing friend, I - and most of us - weren’t taught how to deal with frustration or anger. Many of us were actually taught that expressing anger or throwing temper tantrums was nothing more than being manipulative or trying to get away with something. But this only leads to bottling emotions up until we can no longer stand it and we explode, often taking it out on those around us. Not many of us had parents that got down at our eye-level and said, “I get you’re angry and that’s a valid emotion. Do you want to talk about what makes you angry?...Oh? What else?” Most of us grew up in households where expressing emotions like anger was considered misbehavior.

Except that it’s not. Alfie Kohn famously writes that every act of misbehavior has at its core a valid complaint. The trick is to give kids – and ourselves – the skills to express that valid complaint in language. I know for myself that when I act out, I too have a valid complaint at the source, whether it’s that I feel unsupported or overwhelmed or that I need a break and am unable to put my children on “pause” while I take a nap. I suspect if we asked Feliciano and Armstrong if they had a valid complaint at the source of their “unthinkable” actions, we would find they did. I suspect we would find, that, in a country we consider advanced, they felt the struggles that come with not enough support.

We can imagine Feliciano and Armstrong as monsters or unnatural. Or we can consider that like many of us, they didn’t have the tools to handle the wide range of emotions that come with parenting. Like many of us, they found themselves overwhelmed with frustration.

Cleaning Green

noreply@blogger.com (Anastasia) — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 12:30:00 +0000

A couple of years ago, I picked up Renée Loux’s Easy Green Living and read it cover to cover. It’s an informative and inspiring book, filled with ways to live healthier while helping the earth. One of my favorite sections talks about making your own household cleaners. I decided to give it a try and have been hooked ever since. I haven’t bought a commercial cleaner in more than a year! Though I was already using non-toxic name-brand cleaners, I’ve found making my own rewarding, cheaper, and ultimately easier than I thought it would be.

Why switch to non-toxic cleaners in the first place?

Have you ever looked at the ingredients in a spray bottle of a conventional all-purpose cleaner? The list is scary—and dangerous for both human beings and the environment. Common ingredients can include (all sources for this information are cited in Renée’s book):

Ammonia, a toxic substance that can cause permanent damage to the eyes and can burn the skin.

Chlorine, which severely irritates the eyes, skin, and lungs, and is very harmful to inhale. It may cause permanent damage to the lungs, and children are especially at risk for its adverse effects.

Glycol ether, repeated exposure to which can cause liver and kidney damage.

Naptha, found in all purpose glass and surface cleaners, is a possible carcinogen and can cause skin damage, and is very dangerous to inhale.

Phenols, toxic compounds that irritate the eyes, skin, and lungs, and are toxic in the environment.

Terrifying, right? And that’s not even half of the most common ingredients. In the US, manufacturers are not required to list the ingredients in their cleaning products—so we may not even know all the toxic chemicals that we’re using. It’s bad enough to think of the harm this might be causing myself and my husband—but when I started thinking about the possible danger I’m exposing my kids to, for me, switching to non-toxic cleaners was a no-brainer.

Why make your own cleaners?

I look at making my own cleaners the way I look at making most of what we eat from scratch: I know every single thing that has gone into whatever it is we are ingesting, or cleaning with, in this case. No unpronounceable chemicals; no carcinogens or agents harmful to the earth. Before I switched to non-toxic cleaning products, I was always nervous about my kids being around when I cleaned—now I have no fear of them inhaling or swallowing something that can cause them permanent damage.

Making your own cleaners is exponentially less expensive than buying name brand non-toxic ones. There are some wonderful name brand natural cleaners out there, and they do the job well. But they are pricey, and if you’re a neat freak like me and clean often, those costs can really add up. I order all my ingredients from Vitacost.com. Their prices are up to 40% less than other sites I have come across, and some things are as much as 75% less expensive! You can also visit your local natural health store for most of these. I get spray bottles from my local dollar store. You can even use old spray bottles from store-bought cleaners that have run out—just be sure to wash them out thoroughly before mixing your cleaner in them.

Making your own cleaners is also fun! I absolutely love learning about essential oils and their properties, and combining them to create my own scents gives me a chance to get creative. Be sure to keep your oils out of reach of children—ingesting them in large amounts can be harmful. Another note—if you are using a plastic measuring spoon for your essential oils, wash it out with soap immediately after you finish with it, otherwise the oil will corrode the plastic.

Now that you have some good information, why not give making your own household cleaners a try? Here are some of my favorite recipes, taken from Easy Green Living. I’d love to hear from you if you try these, and how you like them.

Lavender-Lemon Disinfecting Spray

Hands down, my favorite. Smells fantastic and I love that it naturally disinfects! You can use this to clean things like kitchen counters and cutting boards—just keep in mind that it won’t necessarily kill all bacteria from raw poultry and meat. Makes about one pint.

¼ cup inexpensive vodka

½ cup 3% hydrogen peroxide (69 cents a bottle at my local drugstore!)

1 cup water

10 drops essential oil of lavender

5 drops essential oil of lemon

Combine all the ingredients in a spray bottle and swirl to mix them. Be sure not to shake the bottle, or the active oxygen in the peroxide will go flat and lose its action. Spray the surface and wipe, or allow to air dry. Keeps indefinitely!

All-Purpose Citrus Spray

I love this recipe because it uses another inexpensive ingredient: white distilled vinegar. I buy the store brand and the cost ends up being pennies per bottle for this cleaner. One note—if the smell of vinegar bothers you, you may want to skip this one, as the scent does linger for a bit. You may be tempted to add more essential oils to mask the smell—but don’t. When it comes to essential oils, a little goes a long way! Makes about one pint.

½ cup white distilled vinegar

1 tablespoon Citra-Solv Cleaner and Degreaser Concentrate (available at Vitacost.com or your local natural health store)

½ teaspoon natural liquid dish soap or castile soap

1 ½ cups warm water

½ teaspoon total antiseptic essential oils (your choice as to which ones—get creative!)

Combine all the ingredients in a spray bottle and shake well to mix. Keeps indefinitely!

All-Purpose Deodorizing Basic Soda Spray

This is a great recipe for scouring and scrubbing—and it uses two super-inexpensive ingredients—baking and club soda! Be sure to wipe off after spraying, because the baking soda can leave a residue. Makes about one pint.

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ castile soap

½ teaspoon total rosemary and sweet orange essential oils

1 cup very warm water

1 cup club soda

Combine the baking soda, soap, essential oils, and water in a spray bottle. Screw the top on, shake vigorously to combine the ingredients, and then add the club soda. Swirl to mix it in.

Heavy-Duty Floor Cleaner

I don’t know why, but it seems like commercial floor cleaners are the most expensive of the lot. This is easy, cheap, and smells wonderful! My kids and husband have all commented on how good the house smells after I’ve mopped with this.

2 gallons warm water

½ cup distilled white vinegar

¼ cup Citra-Solv Cleaner and Degreaser Concentrate

2 tablespoons natural liquid dish soap

½ teaspoon essential oil of lavender

Mix all ingredients in a bucket, and mop away!

Basic Soda Fizz Toilet Scrub

OK, the toilet situation can get yucky, and you may be temped to use a conventional toxic cleaner because it just makes the grime go away. Don’t do it! This recipe is easy, quick, and cleans just as well.

1 tablespoon castile or other natural liquid soap

1/3 cup baking soda

1/3 distilled white vinegar

8 drops essential oil of lavender, rosemary, or both

Squirt the soap into the toilet bowl, and then drop the baking soda on top. Pour in the vinegar and essential oils. Let it fizz for 2-3 minutes, then scrub the bowl with a toilet brush, and flush. Enjoy the sparkle!

***

Good luck and happy green cleaning!

Mama Cloth Review and Giveaway - Fussybutt Moonbows!

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 12:00:00 +0000

I admit, when I was first researching cloth diapers for my daughter before I was even pregnant, I came across mama cloth and was a little put off by it. However, once I started cloth diapering, I knew I wanted to make the switch and I didn't even think twice about it again. I searched and searched for the brand that I thought would suit me best. I did not like the idea of PUL or fleece backing, and that's when I found Fussybutt Moonbows - mama cloth topped with soft velour, with an absorbent bamboo core and backed with breathable wool. I thought it was an appropriate first mothers day gift to start a small stash, and as soon as they arrived, I knew I'd made the right choice. I love them so much that I offered to write this review and set up the giveaway based on my experience with the ones I've purchased for myself, just so more women can learn about Moonbows! :)

*Note: If you are squeamish about talk of periods, you may not want to read any further! ;)

The only thing bad I have to say about my moonbows is that I am so upset I didn't have them from day one of getting my period many years ago! All these years with uncomfortable, crunchy plastic pads filled with toxic chemicals! Ugh! The wool backing helps to keep them from shifting/bunching, and I actually think they bunch far less than any disposable pad. They are available in a large variety of sizes, shapes and styles, with custom fabric options to accommodate different flows. I happen to have a very, very heavy flow, often going through a super plus tampon and a full size pad in a matter of hours. Even so, my moonbows always hold up. I have never had a leak - EVER. The x-large size even stands up to my heaviest of overnights.

For those new to the mama cloth game, you may wonder how to deal with the inevitable.... Personally, I run it under cold water in the sink while I'm using the toilet. Then I wring it out under running water repeatedly until it runs clear, which takes but a minute. The velour enables them to rinse so clean, most of mine don't even have any stains after nearly a year of use! Then I drape them over the edge of my laundry basket so they don't get buried wet, but they go in with the regular laundry. That's it! Easy peasy! [*Note - I use Ecover Fabric Softener occasionally to keep them velvety soft. While it is recommended to avoid fabric softeners because they can cause repelling, it is a well known secret in the cloth diapering world that Ecover can be safely used without causing any issues, and I have had none so far.] Some may choose to wash theirs separately, but I think it's really no different than washing underwear that may have been stained with an accidental leak - the moonbows probably rinse even cleaner. And for traveling, I have a small, washable, waterproof bag I take with me in my purse, and depending on the bathroom I will either rinse them immediately or just stick them in the bag and deal with it when I get home.

I cannot say enough good things about Fussybutt Moonbows. I'm so, so, so glad I chose them! I just can't imagine there are much better pads out there! They are so unbelievably comfortable and absorbent, not to mention beautifully crafted. After nearly a year of use, most of mine look practically brand new. Not a thread out of place, and barely a stain. Christy is a work at home mom who makes superior products! Not only does she make amazing cloth pads, but she also makes diapers, wipes, underwear and more. For the most customizable options and sizes, they can be purchased directly from her site at justfussy.com. I purchased mine at bananapeelsdiapers.com, but they are also available at clothdiaperoutlet.com, sweetbottomsbaby.com and cottontailbaby.com

For those interested in trying one, we are giving away one 10" Regular All-In-One Pad with wool backing as our first prize, and a 7" bamboo velour/bamboo fleece liner to a runner up!

TO ENTER:

(MANDATORY ENTRY) - Tell us the Fussybutt product on www.JustFussy.com you like most or would most like to try in the comments of this blog post below, and enter on the rafflecopter widget below (you may need to click "Read More" if the widget doesn't appear)

Additional Entries - "like" Just Fussy on Facebook, "like" Connected Mom on facebook

a Rafflecopter giveaway

"Don't Ignore Infertility"

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

This week, April 22 - 28, is National Infertility Awareness Week. The theme this year is one that is so important for all those not struggling with infertility.

"Don't Ignore Infertility"

Infertility is one of the hardest things a couple will have to go through. Support is so crucial so the process doesn't swallow them.

For those that haven't had to struggle through infertility, whether primary or secondary, it's hard to know how to support a friend. One in eight couples now suffer through infertility, whereas a couple years ago it was one in ten. It may not seem like a lot, but chances are you know at least one couple that is having trouble getting pregnant and/or keeping a pregnancy.

One of the best things you can do is not ignore their infertility. For a lot, it feels like they are failing. It may not be logical, but one thing that is so important is raising a family and when you can't? It is so incredibly difficult to live with. Friends and acquaintances you were close to pull away, and that can make this process even harder.

Don't ignore their struggle. You can still be happy for yourself and your family while supporting them when they need it most. Don't offer platitudes to make their situation not seem as huge. Most personal stories and advice that I've been given in the four years we've been trying to have a second child leave me in tears because they're just a pat on the head. They're stories of "oh this woman I knew" and "just relax and it will happen".

If you are wondering what you can do? Become educated on this issue that so many people are struggling with. Be there for them. Learn what you can do as a family member and friend. And if you're still wondering? Ask them what you can do. Even if it is just a simple thing like remembering a date that's important to them while they go through this.

In the end, just don't ignore. What an important message, which you can take to other parts of your life.

And for those struggling through infertility, their is hope and their is support. Resolve is an amazing organization and a great place to start. And I am always available if you need someone to talk to (connectedmom.kayce@gmail.com). And in the end, let's break the stigma around infertility and realize love and support are so much more important than struggling alone.

Talking About Work

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 11:59:00 +0000

Before last week’s Rosen/Romney exchange about work, my son and I had been talking a lot about work. When we go out and about in the city, much like a Sesame Street or Mr. Rogers episode, we talk about the various people we see working, from the garbage man, to the masons building a stone wall, the construction workers fixing the sidewalk with the cement mixer, the mail person, or the sushi chef at our favorite bodega. We talk about what various relatives do for work, how Abuela teaches teachers how to teach children, while his aunt designs couture wedding dresses and his uncle takes pictures. Most mornings after his dad leaves for work, he loads up an old MacBook Pro box (that he calls his briefcase though neither my husband nor I have ever carried such a thing) with his toys and announcing that he’s going to work.

When our nanny comes a few afternoons a week, I tell him that I too am going to get some work done, but I think my work of writing confuses him a little, because the lines that define it are a little more blurry. For example, I still keep his baby sister with me, while I do it. I also tend to sneak in writing a line here or there when I am with him, or let him sit on my lap while I write, which works as long as he sits still.

Most days, however, when my husband walks out the door or when my husband is on his computer in the morning, my son is clear that my husband is working while I am with him. He’s even said, “Daddy’s working. We’re not.”

I have pointed out that play is children’s work. I started to say too, that to be clear, I was working while spending time with him, that the care taking, activity organizing, snack packing, art & dance class researching, preventing one child from harming the baby as well as any form of tantrum and schlepping both kids to and from the city via subway was indeed work.

But given that often one connotation of work is that it’s arduous, strenuous, and unsatisfying struggle, I didn’t want him to think that I found spending time with him an arduous, strenuous, and unsatisfying struggle. Until I watched him spend his morning packing his MacBook Pro box with toys and announce to me that he was going to work and he’d see me later, did I realize that he didn’t connotate work with being arduous, unsatisfying or strenuous at all. He thinks work is fun; after working with his dad and uncle in the back yard, hauling bucket after bucket of sand from the front of the house to the backyard sandpit, he thinks its something you do with people you enjoy spending time with. When he types on a book pretending its his computer, he also thinks he’s working. He finds it satisfying, and I realized that I too found it satisfying, and that many days my work as a writer is similar to my work as a mother; some days are fun and great, and some days suck.

After the Rosen/Romney exchange, I found myself thinking a lot about work as I watched age-old arguments resurface as if they were new ideas, whether women (parents really – this includes fathers) should take time off and stay home with their children or they should stay working and can we consider the work of parenting in the home the same as working outside the home (and isn't it odd that we call mothers who work outside the home "working mothers" but don't call fathers who work outside the home "working fathers"?). No, the work of raising children isn’t paid. When a parent chooses to stay home to raise a child, they give up not just their career (for a bit – most SAHMs and SAHDs aren’t staying home forever), but their Social Security credits and retirement earnings. Many defend this, as Leslie Bennett writes for the Daily Beast, “All mothers know that motherhood involves a lot of hard work, but let’s stop pretending that that’s the same as working for a living. It isn’t. When you’re a stay-at-home mom, somebody else is bringing home the paycheck.” This is true, but that doesn’t make it right. One of the sticky points is that being a mom, and especially one who stays home is unpaid labor. And as Bennetts writes in The Feminine Mistake, many SAHM moms have a rude awakening about how much they did give up when they chose to stop working, that re-entering the work force is rough, or god forbid, if she finds herself getting divorced, or facing any other kind of economic hardship being an economic dependent will only work against her. The laws are not in favor of anyone who contributed the unpaid labor of the home. This is also true, but again, that doesn’t make it right.

We often assume how things work is the only way things can work, so clearly, those who stay home with children shouldn’t be paid because it doesn’t currently work that way. But what if we imagined something different? In The Price of Motherhood, Ann Crittenden writes, “women may be approaching equality, but mothers are still far behind. Changing the status of mothers, by gaining real recognition for their work, is the great unfinished business of the women’s movement.”

Indeed, as we now have Mitt Romney’s proposal that women receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) should go back to work after their child is two, so that they may know the “dignity” of work. Somehow he doesn’t have to explain how the person providing daycare is also working and knowing the dignity of that work, while doing that same “work” yourself doesn’t provide the same dignity. He also doesn’t explain the rather class based assumption, that poorer mothers especially need such dignity (they must somehow lack it being on TANF? being poor? Maybe their lack of dignity and pride in themselves is what landed them on assistance in the first place?). While middle and upper class women either don’t need that dignity or they already have it, because of their class – I don’t know, and it’s odd he was having his wife answer for such things, but she was curiously silent on this one. Nonetheless, he’s rather frank about his view, that choosing to stay home with your children for the lower classes shouldn’t be a choice, and it’s work outside the home that gives us dignity.

I admire the work of other countries here, countries like Norway where a mother can take a year off work and have her job held open by law, and the government sends her a check of 80% of what she earned at her job. This check is like a paycheck, as income and social security taxes were withheld and she earned social security credits for her time home with her children. (And isn’t this novel – to give women a year off, coincidentally the same amount of time that so many organizations recommend a mother breast feed her baby? Could we possibly see an increase in breast feeding rates if maternity leaves actually lined up with the medical recommendations for new mothers?) France too offers families subsidies for the raising of children, including free health care, housing subsidies and high quality free preschools.

I know the standard response is coming. Americans supposedly aren’t interested in paying for the kinds of socialized services that other countries provide. If Americans want to take time out of the workforce to take care of an aging family member, a new baby, young family, or a special needs child, they do so at a cost financially and personally, with others judging their work as undignified and not nearly as valid as the work they did in the workforce, simply because it’s personal. Yet the personal is social. What we value personally should be reflected in what we value socially and what we value with our tax dollars. American politicians - like Norway politicians – love to talk about their strongly held family values; Norway just supports their values with money, because they feel that the raising of a child is real work and it’s work that provides value for all of society. As a friend told me over the weekend, what goes on her resume for her time spent with her children? Grooming the next leader.

Parenting isn’t paid, but not because it’s not dignified or not valid or doesn’t deserve space on our resumes. It’s not paid because we haven’t found a way to pay for it and we haven’t valued the work of it enough to deem it worthy of our financial attention.

Granted, many argue that it shouldn’t be paid or receive compensation, even Social Security credits, because it’s our children. The emotional reward should be enough, plus it can be really fun. Parenting is fun and rewarding, but it’s also stressful, and sometimes more so than the work outside the home. And I say this after talking to people have taken time off from being public school teachers, politicians, neuroscientists, doctors, professors and academics, lawyers, advertising executives, and so on – people who found their work fun, rewarding and stressful. There are many days my husband comes home from his work and tells me about his hard and stressful day, but he always ends it with, “it was hard, but not as hard as what you did today.” I appreciate that he’s aware of this, and I take it as an acknowledgement (the same way I take my 3 year-old saying, “Thanks for cooking dinner, Mom.”). In the current culture of work and family values, where parents are penalized for taking time off from working outside the home, it’s all I’m going to get.

Not Perfect, and Not Trying To Be

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:08:00 +0000

In the past month or so, several posts have weaved in and out of my newsfeed with the same theme: the unrealistic expectations of motherhood. Variations have touched on why children need a mother who is truly present rather than a perfectionist, the oneupmanship of stay-at-home moms, and an attack on mommy bloggers for publishing idealistic portrayals of parenthood . . . as well as the typical tired mommy wars chatter.

If you believe what these writers (all women, all mothers) have to say, this generation of parents spends an awful lot of time comparing themselves to each other and coming up short.

But is it even true? Does it resonate with most women? Do moms see this kind of gibberish and honestly think I'm not good enough?

I have a hard time wrapping my brain around this.

Let's start with the obvious: mothering is work (yes, true work), although sometimes what we do can be difficult to verbalize. However, I don't see it as a competition. Really.

To me, it doesn't matter what other mothers are cooking, knitting, tweeting, teaching, designing, or (gasp!) writing.

Tell me I'm not an anomaly for not caring to liken myself to others. I don't do wishful thinking. I don't do second-guessing. I don't do guilt.

Don't get me wrong . . . I love the dialogue. I love swapping stories. I even love commiserating at times. But I never feel inadequate reading about someone else's life. (And if I did, I would . . . wait for it . . . stop reading.)

Are there just not enough mommy bloggers who show the "real" side of parenting? And what exactly would that look like?

Anyone who pops by my blog for more than 30 seconds could not possibly have delusions that our life is perfect around here. Things I ponder in a typical post might include my woeful attempts at becoming organized, how I can prevent my toddler from falling off the couch and slamming his noggin into the tile floor, and potty training a four-year-old. Ooh . . cleaning out closets, potential head injuries, and poop.

Envious yet?

I stay home with my children because it's the best choice for our current family situation. (And in spite of the daily insanity it's actually kind of . . . fun.)

I homeschool Agent E because it works for her. (And it has all sorts of surprise benefits.)

I share our adventures on a blog because I like to write. (It's just kind of a bonus that others occasionally find what I have say relatable.)

But I certainly don't do any of those things to make someone I don't even know feel bad. I don't expect anyone to make the same choices we do, nor do I take issue with another parent's choices (assuming they are not verbally or physically abusive).

How do you feel when you read "mommy blogs"? Amused or annoyed? Inspired or intimidated? Share in the comments.

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

Why I Support Out of Hospital Birth

noreply@blogger.com (Shawna) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:33:00 +0000

I've never had a home birth and I'm not sure I ever will. I thought I should get that out at the beginning, just in the interest of complete honesty, because what I want to address is the topic of out of hospital births and I think it's important for others to know that I don't have personal experience with out of hospital births. What I do have personal experience with is the anxiety a mother feels while making her birth decisions and I think every woman should have the right to choose the birth environment that makes sense to her.

I have known at least four smart, well-researched women who have had births at home or free standing birth center births and I fully supported them in those births and would support anyone else who also chose to birth outside of a hospital and here's why: Home birth does not equal a nineteenth century birth that eschews all modern medicine. Home birth just means a birth that occurs at home. (If any interventions had seemed necessary or if complications such as infection, bleeding, or anything else had arisen, I know that each of them would have been at the hospital in a minute! In fact, one of my friends did have some hemorrhaging and she did not hesitate to go to the hospital because that is what hospitals are for--helping people who need modern medicine or interventions before, during, or after birth!) People who choose to home birth are not necessarily anti-interventions and anti-medicine, they are just anti-interventions unless they are necessary and appropriate.

A person who home births is no less anti-necessary medicine than a person who tries safe, effective home remedies for a cold or an injury before going to the hospital. The truth is that for most healthy women who are at low risk for complications and whose baby is at low risk for complications, the hospital with all of its bells and whistles is not necessary and being in the hospital (many argue) puts that low risk woman in danger of interventions that might be unnecessary in a lower stress, more familiar environment like the home. Home is also usually within a comfortable driving distance of a hospital. After all, we trust our home to be safe enough that if any kind of dangerous accident happens there (like a tree falling, or a poisoning, or a fall down the stairs, or a knife/chainsaw/lawn mower incident--all of which, by the way, are more common than a catastrophic birth experience), we will get to the hospital in time or we wouldn't buy that home to begin with.

I get why people are nervous about home births. The thought of anything happening to a newborn baby is too awful to contemplate. If you are that afraid that something will happen in your birth or with your newborn that it will need immediate attention and cannot wait the ten or fifteen minute car ride to a hospital (or whatever distance the nearest birth center or your home is from the hospital), than you are absolutely correct to birth in a hospital. You have decided that you are fine with a twenty percent increased risk of getting a c-section and a much higher risk of having some other kind of intervention, and I don't think anyone will judge you for it. You weighed your risks and your options and you made a choice that the ability to have interventions if you need them is more important to you than the risk of having interventions you don't need. That's fine. Conversely, if you have researched it and you are willing to take the risk that the distance your house is from the nearest emergency room might be too much if something catastrophic happens in your birth, than I think you should have the right to take that risk without judgment as well. A mother who chooses home birth or an out of hospital birth has probably weighed her risk options and used the same kind of reasoning, love, and care to come to her own decision. No one should assume she hasn't. She isn't being selfish. She just chose to take a slight risk of something happening without immediate intervention, over a much higher risk of an intervention happening without it being necessary.

I also understand why many doctors and nurses are anti-home birth and don't understand why anyone would choose it. I have known a couple of nurses who work in NICUs or labor units in hospitals and they cringe to think about babies born outside of hospitals because in their line of work they have only ever seen home birth babies and mothers with complications. However, that's because the only time out of hospital birthing babies or mothers come to the hospital is when there is a complication. Nurses and doctors know very little about healthy home births because they have never been involved in them. Because only about .67 percent of women in the US had home births in 2011, I have to believe that most hospital interventions and NICU resources are used for hospital births. In fact, elective inductions (choosing to have your labor induced when it is past your due date or for another non-medical reason--a trend that has grown to nearly 30% of all births in some hospitals) result in more babies being placed in the NICU than home births.

However, what I don't understand is people who get angry with women and try to take their right to choose their place of birth away from them simply because they would not make that same choice themselves. It is not as if most of these women are denying medical help when they need it; they are simply denying medical help unless or until they need it. There is a world of difference between those two statements. I respect women's rights to make their own, educated medical decisions no matter if their choices agree with mine or not. Other people should do the same; it's not like they are trying to take away the right to choose birth in hospitals.

Thanks for reading,

Shawna

When Healthy Food Doesn't Matter

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

When I'm pregnant with a baby that "sticks" for longer than a week or two, I get extremely sick. Normal morning sickness is a dream compared to how sick I get. I have hyperemesis gravidarum, or severe sickness when pregnant that nothing can treat and doesn't get better with time. When you're pregnant, you're not supposed to lose weight and then barely gain anything (if you even gain). Morning sickness is supposed to go away and you're supposed to have a great rest of the pregnancy.

I don't have that. I'm okay with how mine go because I'm prepared for it, not that they are fun by any means, but I've learned that when it is like this, eating healthy for me and my daughter flies out the window.

Most of the day (without medication to help and lots of natural remedies combined day to day), I can hardly stand up with feeling sick or rushing to the bathroom, so I can't stand up and make healthy food from scratch. It's just not possible.

My natural food side cringes, but my sustain my family side realizes that it's okay to not eat healthy if something is stopping it.

If you came and looked at my pantry right now, most people in this community would shudder and walk away judging me. And you know what, I'm okay with that.

It's filled with foods my daughter can make herself, foods I can make with very minimal effort, and a lot of foods I wouldn't dream of feeding my family except in times like these.

Sometimes, you have to go with what works. Sometimes, it is completely okay to buy plastic containers and bags, to buy very cheap food with tons of preservatives, to do what you have to do to make it through.

Life throws you curve balls. Nothing can go completely how you plan or how you envision your life to be. This is a struggle for us, going from eating mostly home cooked meals to eating a lot of what I consider junk, but it's how life works.

If you can't always eat healthy and how you want your family to eat, that is completely okay! Don't feel that you are any less of a great mother or father, because you are amazing. You do as much as you can, and let the "slack" fall where it may.

Motherhood Changes Everything

noreply@blogger.com (Anastasia) — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:09:00 +0000

Motherhood changes everything. Even when you think that things couldn’t possibly become any more different—they do, and you are once again plunged into the dark unknown, completely against your will; completely unprepared, yet again. I’ve been a mom for seven years, and each age and stage my children have gone through has been harder, and better, than the last.

Such was my life during my son’s first year. The first six months, when my days were spent trying to decipher Alex’s cries, settle him to sleep, feed him, bathe him, all while trying to squeeze in a shower and maybe a glass of water for myself, seemed like a cakewalk when I returned to work and post partum depression reared its ugly head. It was as if nothing in the outside world was different. Other than the occasional query about my baby, people’s lives went on, unchanged. How was this possible when my entire world had become impossibly twisted? The earth had not stopped spinning because I had become a mother, at least not to anyone else but me.

It felt odd to walk around without my big belly after almost a year of being pregnant. My body was different. I’d been through so much in labor and delivery, and in addition to pregnancy weight, I’d gained stretch marks, a lingering baby pouch, and so much guilt-- about, well, everything.

I had expected motherhood to make me feel confident, invincible, and happy. Instead I was unsure of myself, vulnerable, and miserable. I felt so guilty for working, and that emotion consumed me. I was constantly exhausted and emotionally drained. I missed my baby intensely and I felt like I never saw him. I had enormous amounts of confusion and uncertainty about what my life was about. All this was such a blow to me, as I had thought motherhood would bring about all the opposite. I was also confused because since I had experienced the normal baby blues immediately following Alex’s birth (and come through them easily) this new set of feelings was unexpected.

The whole world suddenly seemed different; bigger, more dangerous—and having produced a human being inside my body that was now out in that same world, I felt intensely protective and helpless. A car could hit me on my way to work. My baby could die of SIDS. In the mornings, I made sure to memorize what color shirt my husband was wearing, just in case I had to describe him to the police later on because he disappeared. I recognized these thoughts as irrational, but I couldn’t stop them. The very thought that we were not going to be in this world forever to protect our baby filled me with despair.

Could I ignore the changes to my marriage? It was as if we had never existed as a couple before our son. What did we used to talk about? What did we do on our dates? Would we ever have a date, or time alone, again?

I also eventually had to admit that the difficult labor and delivery I had with my son had a lot to do with how I felt that entire first year. My experience was emotionally devastating, to say the least (and that’s another blog post!), and left me feeling helpless, scared, and not trusting of myself and my abilities as a mother.

Looking back, I should have asked for help. I spent too many days feeling despondent and unhappy, crippled by emotions that I couldn’t describe to anyone. Why is it that so many new mothers experience some form of depression or anxiety yet so many are unwilling to talk about it? The first year is so hard. There are infinite changes, and it’s normal to feel ambivalent about motherhood, resentful of the new responsibilities; even trapped. Not discussing it, or hiding it, is in part what leads to depression. I’ve never heard any new parent say, “yeah, we go to sleep at the same time we always did, take long showers daily, and eat dinner together every night.” Why is it that we can so easily discuss the logistical changes in our life as we knew it, but not the emotional ones? We all try to lose the pregnancy weight, go back to work, get back to normal, so quickly—as if we’re in a rush to prove something, as if we don’t want to admit that we’re not so sure about this new life as a parent—that everything is different. And it always will be.

Susan Maushart discusses this very thing in The Mask of Motherhood: How Becoming a Mother Changes Our Lives and Why We Never Talk About It. Says Maushart, “Experiencing ambivalence about motherhood is one thing. Expressing it—and by extension, legitimizing it—is quite another. The mask of motherhood ensures that the face of ambivalence, however widely or keenly felt, remains a guilty secret.” She found that the women who were able to be honest about their emotions were the ones least likely to be depressed.

Slowly, my life returned back to normal. Or, I should say, we all found a new normal. I am not who I was before I had children—I’m better. My husband and I now date regularly—even if it’s just a bowl of popcorn and a rented movie. We eat dinner together every night, and we talk, a lot. His compassion, patience, and support make him a wonderful father and an amazing partner. Years have passed since those early foggy days, but certain things will bring me back; a smell, a lullaby. I remember where I was and am proud of myself for how far I’ve come.

I know my feeling better was gradual, and the depression I experienced was relatively short-lived. But I honestly only noticed how different I am now compared to a few years ago just this past summer. After an afternoon out and about, as I was walking home with my children, I happened to notice how blue the sky was that day. Then I noticed the leaves blowing in the trees, and heard the birds singing. And as I lifted my head up, I closed my eyes, felt the warm sun on my face, and I took a deep breath--I thought, my god, finally, I am happy. And it was the most amazing feeling.

Is Technology All Good?

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 13:33:00 +0000

As a child born in the mid 70’s, my generation has witnessed a pretty radical lifestyle shift due to technological advances. It is a transformation that will no doubt continue to insert itself further and further into our lives with the development of each new “must have” gadget. It begs the question – are these things really “must have” items? I grew up with a hand-me-down walkman, and my first one speaker boom box with a shoulder strap (which I thought was the greatest thing ever!) wasn’t bestowed upon me until the 5^th grade. After saving babysitting money years later, I purchased my first CD player in 9^th grade. My parents didn’t get cable TV until we’d all moved out, so my childhood television viewing was limited to VHF/UHF, and we had a giant antenna in the attic that my father would go up and adjust while the chain of kids would yell up from our remoteless, knobbed TV in the living room to give the OK that the reception was clear. Do I feel deprived in the least? On the contrary, I think we were quite fortunate. I do not necessarily believe that we as a society are better off with all of these techno toys. I’m sure many would disagree, but I feel like for children it encourages the slow death of imagination, and for some, it can drastically alter their abilities to seek information and formulate intelligent thoughts without pushing a button first. Most importantly, all of these technological accessories that have infiltrated nearly every aspect of our lives can take away dramatically from family time. The compulsion to equip each family member with every electronic “necessity” is contributing to a society where parents spend far more time working, and causes an increasing economic struggle as more and more “required" items enter our lifestyles.

I believe some of the driving forces behind the incessant pursuit of all the latest and greatest devices are celebrity worship, and/or the almost obligatory American desire to acquire status symbols. In the 80’s, only the wealthy could talk on seemingly unattainable car phones. With global corporate expansion and sweatshops abound, we now have an affordable means for the middle class to connect to the upper class. The school teacher with a modest income may not have a million dollar home, but now they can have the same iPad as someone who does. It’s a morsel of luxury and status thrown out for the rest of us to enjoy. (Insert celebrity here) has XYZ smartphone, and I can have one too! But now my husband and son need one, and the kids need iPods, and no respectable member of the middle class could be caught with an old tube television, and of course little Janie is on the computer all the time, so I guess we need a second computer, maybe even an iPad, and let’s not forget cell phone plans for all of those smartphones, and the multi-room DVR cable package for all of our TV sets. When will it be enough? What cost are parents and children really paying for all of this “connectivity” and convenience? Who are we really connecting to?

My husband and I have no desire to own a smartphone, and at least once a month I question whether the two of us even need cell phones. I realize there are probably quite a few professions out there where there is an expectation that you must stay connected by all means possible, and in that instance, I’m sure a smartphone could almost be deemed a necessity. But does the 20 something barista at my local coffee shop or a 10 year old child need to maintain that sort of connectivity? It pains me to see people dining out with friends, and everyone at the table has a cell phone in their hands, rather than engaging in conversation. I wince even more when I see parents do it around their children. Every time I see a toddler in a doctor’s waiting room playing games on mom’s phone, my heart sinks deeper and I begin to wonder what the world will be like when my daughter grows up.

Well meaning friends and family have given our daughter their phones to play with on a few occasions, and we usually oblige because we’re not that concerned about a handful of exposures. However, it is simply not built into my instincts to reach for my phone to entertain her no matter where we are, and the same can be said of my husband. Our goal is to try to inspire her to create, imagine and play freely as much as possible. We live by a pretty strict no plastic unless absolutely necessary policy in all aspects of our lives, but particularly when it comes to our daughter’s toys. There are a few silicone teethers and a rubber duck made of natural rubber, but beyond that, no plastic. This means she doesn’t own anything that plays tunes at the press of a button with flashing lights and eye catching moving parts. However, she does have tons of musical instruments, and she loves to grace us with performances. She has cars that move if she makes them go, and she delights as they race across the floor. She adores dancing, and will even take her “babies” for a romp on the dance floor, but the only movements they perform are those that she does for them, not the other way around. At 21 months, I have watched as she continues to “invent” little games, and these are the things that most often induce uproarious laughter. A few months back, I was upstairs when my mother was babysitting and heard my daughter’s shrieks and giggles echoing through the house. I came down to find the source of the commotion was that she had taken a water bottle and turned it upside down on a spoon handle, and was shaking it back and forth to rattle it. Another time I came back from the bathroom to find her standing at her table, blissfully entertained while spinning her baby that was draped over a bowl. A few days later she and I spent quite some time taking turns rolling a ball around inside a bowl as fast as we could until it flew out. That unexpected moment the ball would fly out cracked her up every time. I realize that many toddlers are completely satisfied with simple items like boxes, and perhaps many would do the same as she had. And yet, I can’t help but wonder if she would’ve been so utterly happy and captivated during any of these instances if she had spent the last year and a half inundated with toys that do everything for her.

My intent is not to shame parents about their plastic toys or for using smartphones. I think every parent makes the choices they think are best for their children, and everyone has different things that are important to them. As long as parents love their children I respect those decisions, even if it includes giving them all plastic, animatronic toys - just as I’d hope they’d respect my decision not to. I don’t know their situation or their reasoning and I don’t pretend to. I’m also not trying to say that all technology is evil, or the internet is bad, or computers are bad, or even smartphones. I realize that many of the things I’ve spoken of have their merits, especially when it comes to accessing and sharing information. I don’t think that all kids should be limited to the 1963 edition of the World Book Encyclopedia when in the confines of their home to do school reports. Information is fantastic! But learning in the process - having to read through pages to find what you’re looking for, and having the ability to access that information beyond pressing a few keys is extremely critical. Beyond that, imagination is even more valuable, as is human interaction - especially in families. It is the excess with which our society has begun to cling to all things technological that concerns me. The implications of it all on our children…on ourselves…. How many people are struggling that much more to maintain a lifestyle of data plans, service contracts and continual upgrades on their futile quest of keeping their devices from becoming obsolete? Is the economy the only thing to blame for the diminishing middle class? Or is it the inevitable result of a society perpetually striving for just too many material objects - objects that didn’t exist 5, 10 and 20 years ago.

The Due Month

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Yes, I have a due date. No, I'm not going to tell you.

The idea of a due date is such a wonderful thing, especially if you know when you ovulated. You can know the exact date your baby should be "ready" for birth! That's huge! Or is it?

The biggest issue with due dates is that date is implanted so far into your brain that even if you know you aren't overdue until 42 weeks, your mind automatically goes from "I have time left" to "OMG WHY WON'T THIS BABY LEAVE MY UTERUS, YOUR TIME IS UP!"

Which is actually a very understandable thing when you're big and sore and exhausted, but it's rough seeing women all the time going from happy to completely miserable all because they have passed their due date.

Back in the day, when birth was normal and something to not be feared, you didn't have a due date. You had a due season. It was perfectly acceptable to tell others that you were due in the spring and they wouldn't keep prying. Their eyes would gloss over and they would imagine a baby in the spring and how wonderful that would be.

Now, if you don't tell people your exact due date, obviously something is wrong. They push and push until you tell them or you walk away from a very pointless conversation.

A due date should not be that big of a deal to other people. It just shouldn't. Is it their body growing and birthing another human? No, it isn't, and your "eviction" date shouldn't be the highlight of their information.

Due dates have become so entrenched in our society that everyone's pregnancy is defined by this one specific date. Some doctors won't even accept a date that isn't from your last menstrual period even if you know your ovulation date. It's all so controlled and laughable!

Pregnancy is a time where you should be focused on the journey to motherhood, not focused on one particular date. I may be different because of my history, but I believe pregnancy should be enjoyed for every second (even when you are miserable, you're still growing another human which is amazing!) and not counted down until the end date you receive.

I wish we could go back to due seasons, or even due months. That would be so much less stressful for everyone, but especially for the pregnant woman not needing to count the days until her baby is ready for birth.

So yes, I give out a due month or season. And no one, no matter how much they beg and prod, will change that.

The Mundane Child Questions I Don't Know the Answer To

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 05:08:00 +0000

Often, when parents talk about the questions from their children they are not prepared for, they are referring to the questions regarding sex, drugs or religion. Yet, I haven’t been too worried about these. I have no problem being straightforward about sex or explaining that at some point hormones will take over my children’s bodies, give them urges they feel they have no control over, but that they nonetheless are responsible for. I have no problem saying they should without question stay far away from doing any drug that involves a needle, but at some point they may be curious about marijuana, in which case, they again need to be responsible and safe, be with people they trust and not do anything stupid like mix drugs and alcohol and proceed to take themselves for a drive. Religion may be a bit sticky as I will have to explain why some people have one and why we don’t, or that religion is one of those things that in theory was meant to teach all of us how to get along with each other, but instead has led to thousands of years of war. I suspect the religion question will get a little complicated actually.

I am finding, however, that the questions I don’t know how to answer are the ones that are already coming at me from my three year old. Random mundane questions. Questions like, “Why does Mommy’s hair get dirty and mine doesn’t?” I don’t know. I don’t play in a sand pit. I don’t play with friends who dump dirt and leaves in my hair. I don’t play with play dough and then put it on my head. Yet I have to wash my hair – which for some reason is a chore I hate and if I ever am ridiculously rich, it is a chore I will happily pay someone else to do for me – while my son doesn’t. His hair doesn’t get dirty. Except for the time a kid smacked him in the head with a popsicle and last week when he scratched his head with his paint brush and consequently painted the back of his head green, his hair doesn't require washing.

I find I say I don’t know a lot.

“Why was that kid mean to me?”

“I don’t know. I suspect someone was mean to him, now he feels bad and sometimes people deal with feeling bad by being mean to someone else, often someone smaller.”

“Why do they do that?”

I don’t know.

"Why did they put that building there?"

I don't know.

"Why is that kid sad?"

I don't know.

"Why do I need shoes? Why can't I just wear socks outside?"

"I don't know actually. It's not raining or snowing. It's rather warm. Still, we wear shoes even when we'd rather go barefoot."

On the more complicated side of things, we recently pulled out of a playgroup, because one of the parents had a tendency to be overly affectionate and ignore the personal boundaries of the children. After a number of red flags, I realized I had a legitimate safety concern. After my husband and I told the other parents why we would no longer participate, I told Fyo that we wouldn’t play with his friends X and Y any more, because we had a disagreement with the parents.

“Are they mad at you Mom?”

“Yes, they are.”

“Why are they mad at you?”

“Well, I had a concern and I felt uncomfortable. Basically, we had a disagreement about the personal boundaries of children.”

“Why?”

“Well...I don't know. Do you think we could come back to this one later?”

Oh. And politics. I don't really know how to explain politics. When my dad was visiting, I was ranting about the current Republican Party’s war against women and sexist legislation they are trying to push through in various states. My son put his spoon down in his cereal bowl, and said, “Mom! Why are you yelling at your father?”

“Because I’m ranting about the sexist backlash running across the country at the moment. It makes me angry.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s degrading and it’s limits women’s access to healthcare and choices, and when you limit women’s healthcare and choices, it impacts the lives, health, and potential of children, and when you impact the health and potential of children you impact the health and potential of the country.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s how I think it works.”

“Why do you think so?”

Then I looked at my son, and calmly said words I never thought I would say, which were, “Now you sound like my high school History teacher.”

Then later in the day, “Why can’t I have a hot dog in the park?”

“Because the hot dogs they sell in the parks aren’t good quality meat.” My dad, however, proceeded with a description of pink slime.

“What’s pink slime?”

“Exactly the point,” we said.

Some parents do fear the embarrassment or social awkwardness when their kids ask loud questions in public places about disabilities or minorities. So far this has been smooth sailing for us. Thankfully, New York City is a diverse city, so kids have a lot of exposure to a lot of different people, and so far, my son hasn’t had any issues with my answers to the questions on these points:

“Why is that little boy brown?”

“Because that’s the color of his skin. What color is your skin? Different people have different colors of skin.”

“Why does that woman only have one eye?”

“Because something happened to one of her eyes.”

These are a little like a koan. But when my son saw a four year old strapped into a stroller sucking on a pacifier, and asked, “What is that in her mouth? Why?” I was stumped. I don’t know.

“Why do Nana and Grand Dad live in Texas?”

I get agoraphobic in Texas, so I really don’t know why people live there. But I said, “That’s where their families lived, so that’s where they chose to live too.”

“Why do the Abuelos live in Los Angeles?”

“Because that’s where their house is. Abuela lived there when Abuelo fell in love with her, so he moved.”

“Why?”

"I don’t know. He hates the traffic, the suburbs, and the sprawl, but he likes warm weather. It made sense to him."

And most recently, when he sees his baby sister nurse, “Why don’t I nurse any more?”

I don’t really know what to say to this one, but finally say, “it was just something we grew out of.” This isn’t true. He would have nursed until he left for college if he had his way, but I don’t have the heart to tell him that I just got tired.

“When baby goes back into your belly, can I nurse again?”

“Yes. Absolutely. If she finds her way back inside, the nursing is all yours.”

“I like baby on the outside, but I liked her more on the inside. When do you think she’ll go back inside?”

This one I’d actually love to say I don’t know to. But I don’t. I say, once babies are out, they stay out.

“Do you love baby? Do you love me?”

Finally! Questions I know the answer to!

"Yes, I love you both immensely."

“Why?”

Why do parents love their children?

“I don’t know. I just do. I love you because I love you.”

Completely lame. But it was all I could come up with. Still, from my lack of knowledge, I'm hoping he picks up on two things: 1) that it's okay not to know everything all the time and 2) that I'm open to the question and the conversation.

Reasons to Give Public School a Chance

noreply@blogger.com (Shawna) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 12:29:00 +0000

This post will seem like it's coming out of nowhere, but in fact, it stems from my family's search for a new home and the discussions my husband and I have had about the schools in the districts around the area we are planning to settle in. Part of this is a bit of a manifesto and part of this is just me exploring my feelings. Bear with me.

I know that many parents choose home schooling and I completely support a family's right to do so. Until the last 200 years or so, home schooling was the norm. Consequently, many, many intelligent and revolutionary thinkers throughout history are products of homeschooling and tutoring. It is a well established and successful way of imparting education for those who choose to devote themselves to it and believe in it. Meanwhile, universal public education is a fairly new enterprise. It wasn't until 1918 that all then existing states here in the US had laws making school mandatory until the eight grade or age 16. So, public schooling is really still a fledgling project. Institutionalizing education has had a profound effect on it and, many critics argue, a detrimental one. You only have to rent Waiting for Superman or watch any investigative report and you know that our public school system is struggling. Currently, even though my son is only two and is likely four years away from any kind of kindergarten decision, my husband and I have been house hunting and struggling to find the school district we feel we could entrust our son's education to and, frankly, the search is enough to drive us both crazy. Meanwhile, I listen with envy to my friends who are home schooling or are planning to home school and absolutely believe that they have made the right choice for their family. I just don't feel that kind of conviction to home school myself. (I haven't completely ruled it out, either. I feel more than capable enough and willing enough to do it in the right circumstances and whether or not my son goes to school outside the home, I am completely devoted to his education.)

The truth is, there is a part of me that still has a soft spot for the great project of public education. Call it patriotism, call it idealism, but part of me (maybe the same part of me that caused me to work in a public school for four years in a low paying paraprofessional position and to ultimately get my teaching license) is still impressed with a social goal of providing education to all children regardless of race, class, "ability," or gender., (I am a licensed (although that license is about to lapse because of my current devotion to being a stay at home mom) special educator, so accessible learning for students of all capabilities is a special passion of mine.) Compulsory, free, public education was a way of making it possible for even children of parents who could not afford for someone to stay home and teach to still learn from dedicated adults. We may not be meeting all of our reading level goals here and we are struggling, but we enjoy a much more literate society than we did one hundred years ago. It was a revolutionary idea to say that no matter what education level your parents or grandparents obtained, we will try to provide an education that will level the playing field and whatever else motivations that caused compulsory education to become reality (including eliminating child labor competition in business), that was still a prevailing goal of compulsory education.

Furthermore, I can't help but think that I would not be the person I am today if I had not gone to school outside the home and frankly, I'm saying that even though the school I went to the longest during my thirteen years was not even that good. Of course, I had parents who read to me, supported me, and encouraged me to learn outside the home, too. (Just as my son will have.) What strikes me most when I think back on my education is the access I had to people and ideas I never would have encountered ordinarily. Many of my classmates are ones that helped me find my way to attachment parenting and whose friendship has helped me immeasurably in my ongoing journey into motherhood. Where would I be without them? School is doorway that opened up new worlds for me. Did I run into people who challenged the world view my parents subscribe to? Yes. However, I think that was a good thing. Because my beliefs were challenged, I had the opportunity to critically decide whether or not they were beliefs I wanted to own and integrate into my life. I feel like they made me stronger, and I would love for my son to have the same experience. I know that if he goes to school, he will be impressionable, at first, and that is why it will be just as critically important for me to be part of his public education as it would be for me to be a part of his home schooling education. He will still need me to help him discern real argument from propaganda and he will need me to model critical thinking. He will also need me to model strength in convictions and a level of participation that is exhausting to even think about, but that will be true no matter where he learns.

I also must admit that general book learning was easy for me and maybe that is part of why I feel a connection to public education. My primary methods of learning (reading/listening) are the traditional and most prevalent methods available in classrooms. However, after sitting in education classes, I know the traditional school environment I went to is not necessarily the one that my child will go to. There has been a shift in most education communities toward more progressive, constructive learning that encompasses more hands on, real world application, and self-directed, creative projects. Am I saying that is absolutely true for every school? No. But a part of me feels like if that is not the case, especially in a community funded public school, than everyone in the community should get involved until it is. Now, I am a realist in that I know there are many parents out there who do not want to have anything to do with their children's education, but for those of us who do, we can make a difference in the education of both those children and our own children if we make our doubts and criticisms heard. I feel like the last thing a school needs is docility in its parents or in its students and a part of me can't help but feel that if I do choose to home school, I'll be absenting myself from the fight. One of my main reasons why I feel I want to give public schooling a chance is because I do not want to accept the idea that the public school project should be abandoned. Call me vain, but I don't want my family's educational beliefs, our social beliefs, our environmental beliefs, our religious beliefs and even our parenting philosophy to be absent from the lives of the children in our community. I want my son to share his life, his philosophies, and his ideas with people I would never even know to introduce him to and I want it to be while I am still in a position to defend him and to help him stand his ground.

Thanks for reading,

Shawna

A "Field" Trip

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

I won't lie, field trips are one thing I worried about when we decided to homeschool. I loved the field trips we were able to go on when I was in school, and I wanted my daughter to have that too.

This weekend we went with my family to the Fremont Indian Museum and Cove Fort. We've gone places with them before, but not when our daughter was old enough to understand what was going on.

At the Museum, my daughter was enthralled with the video they played before we walked through the museum and walked the grounds to see the rock drawings. She kept looking at my dad and talking about the Indians during the movie, and was so excited to be learning.

We walked through the museum and she crushed corn the way the Fremont Indians did, she climbed in and out of the houses they lived in, looked at everything and was so excited.

When we went on the hike around the Visitor's Center, she would point out the rock paintings to us and would lead everyone in a discussion of what we thought they were drawing.

Outside the center, they have a Granary and a house set up, which you can climb into. We climbed down, talked about how they lived, if we could do it, and where the Fremont Indians might have gone.

After, she bought some rock candy and since it was Easter, you could pick an Easter Egg and keep what was inside. Inside she got a rock in the shape of a rabbit, and every time she sees it, she talks about the Indians and everything she learned.

Cove Fort she was much less interested, but they had places to run around so she really wanted to enjoy the sun before we had to drive the two hours home.

Going there and watching her learn made me realize that she won't need formal field trips to go places and learn new things. Because we will be homeschooling, we can do this whenever we want! Utah is full of history, and Southern Utah is close to a lot of it so we don't have to travel very far to see amazing things.

I can't wait until we go on our next "field" trip.

Piggy Back Traveling

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 14:15:00 +0000

I was having a quiet moment - a rare moment when my husband had taken both children to the park and farmer's market - and reading Valerie's post on Traveling With Little Ones. I started to list in my mind the things I learned from my family's year abroad as well as the things I'd tell the friend of a friend who just asked for the list of things she should know before she took her baby traveling. I did that thing I often do where I intend to write a few sentences in the Comments section but end up with an essay when my computer shut itself down. My comments were lost. So in a fit of frustration, I tossed my planned post and decided to go for what I had just written in Valerie's comments. Alas, I’m piggybacking on her post.

In my family's traveling phase, we left LA for Singapore, and traveled through Bali, Cambodia, and Thailand. When my husband's project ended in Singapore, we went to Bali so my husband could recover from his work-induced exhaustion. We meant to stay just a month, maybe two, but we ended up staying five because of the friends we made, the low cost of living (including a nanny, house cleaner, and a weekly delivery of coconuts that included a person who daily opened one and left the coconut water in my fridge), and Waldorf preschool we loved that cost all of five dollars a day (hence the sticker shock I now face in New York City where preschool is $18,000 a year).

It didn't take long for us in our travels to learn a few things for the sake of our sanity as well as the sanity of our fellow passengers and the airports we were traveling through. Still, when traveling with children and laptops, I can get through airport security with the efficiency of those frequently traveling in business class.

So for my friend who asked for the things she should know - in addition to what Valerie had to say?

1. People will tell you that you are out of your mind for traveling with babies, that your babies will get the plague, will cry incessantly the entire way over the Pacific, or the Atlantic or any other body of water you happen to be flying over, and that upon arrival in your destination you will instantly realize what a terrible idea it was.

Whatever.

Traveling with kids was so much easier than we thought it could be. And we met loads of people who do it and who do it for months at a time with up to four children. We met families who had children who required extra pages in their passports because they had traveled so much.

People will tell you kids require structure and routine and will feel disconnected by constantly packing. Blah. Blah. Blah. Kids (and parents actually) do do well with routine, but routines and structures aren't necessarily dependent on staying still or in one place. Routines can be as simple as breakfast, morning walk, snack, outing, books and nap, playtime, dinner, bath, and bed. You can do that anywhere.

2) Ergo. Ergo. Ergo. Take the Ergo or other baby carrier. I agree with Valerie to ditch the stroller though I also will admit that while we stayed in Singapore we picked up a cheap umbrella stroller for the simple reason that until my son got used to the woman who watched him for ten hours a week it was how she would put him down for a nap. But places like Bali or Bangkok aren't exactly stroller friendly. Throw in that the preferred way of travel in places like Bali is via motorbike and well, you need a way to strap your toddler to your body. You can find a helmet for said toddler upon arrival for the bargain price of seven dollars.

3) I highly recommend delaying weaning for as long as possible if airline travel is in the cards. Air travel while nursing is a piece of cake. My husband and I developed a pretty great circus act when traveling with our son: we’d make him walk from check-in to the gate, then while I sat with our carry on, my husband would “run” our son backwards on the moving sidewalks much like a hamster on a hamster wheel. He loved this as he thought it was a fantastic endless game of chase. We’d board the plane and our son would climb into my lap, nurse, and fall asleep for the flight.

While continuing to nurse made my traveling life much easier, I will throw in a few things to think about. One is that if you are traveling abroad and you are a mother who pumps check the voltage of the country you are going to. If it is different than the one of your pump, it won’t work. You will need to find another kind of pump or hand express. The other thing is nursing while traveling can take a toll on your immune system for the simple reason that your body is working really hard, so eat well, drink loads of water, and avoid sugars and processed foods. Don’t shortchange your sleep, especially when jet lagged. If you’re going to someplace hot, either take or find in a pharmacy there, WHO rehydration salts to put in your water to help keep the family hydrated.

4) On the occasions when our son would not immediately conk out on the plane, our pediatrician said – if we were comfortable with it – that we could take sublingual melatonin tablets and crush them up, and give a fraction of it to our son. This also helped with some of the jet lag. Because our son was still teething, we also took Hyland’s Teething tablets, which eased his teething pain enough so he could sleep. This worked great with him. That said, all kids are different; my daughter is having a much rougher time with teething and the Hyland tablets don’t work the same magic on her.

5) If you are traveling for an extended amount of time, maintain your friendships and connections even if it’s just via facebook or other social media. While I loved the experience of living and traveling abroad, I also at moments felt isolated. When my son started scratching me while he nursed, I consulted a lactation consultant, yet Singapore has even lower breastfeeding rates than the US. I was literally one of four women (all of us ex-pats) on the entire island who had continued to breastfeed her baby longer than the usual Singaporean three weeks. Nursing a baby into toddlerhood was almost unheard of even in the ex-pat community. Her advice? Wean him. Because I couldn’t fathom such a thing, I immediately contacted my stateside lactation consultant who was able to offer some helpful ideas and get me through my rough spot.

6) Take adult and infant/child vitamins, basic medicines and Probiotics with you – especially the Probiotics as they can help boost your child’s immune system while traveling. Even if such things are available where you are going, when you need them, you will be glad you have them and don’t have to search the city to find them.

7) We found disposable diapers to be ridiculously expensive while overseas, and, often, they were the equivalent of a trash bag outfitted with Scotch tape. Our son, at 14 months, protested the wearing of them – and we could hardly blame him. We handled this by toilet training him early and he was out of diapers by 21 months. We still maintain that this was one of our best parenting decisions – partly because we both get grossed out by poo and partly because we trusted our son’s communication and partly because of our decreased footprint on the planet. Also, it was easier to toilet train him while he was imitating us already rather than establishing his independence as a three year old. So, I highly recommend early toilet training if you can stand it. (I referred to a little book called Diaper Free Before Three for help.)

8) Start a blog for your family to capture your travels. It’s a good way for friends and extended family members follow your adventures and to participate in the growth of your little ones. Take your laptop and you can post anywhere you find an Internet connection. Kids love to look at pictures of them selves and later on, they will love to see all the places you dragged them.

9) When you or those close to you express doubts about traveling with kids, gently remind them that the place you are going has children. Thankfully, children exist and survive in every single country on the planet. And I can’t think of a better way to teach your children that you value new experiences, learning through living, and different cultures and diversity than through traveling.

Sunday School: Pure Play

noreply@blogger.com (Mandi Spencer) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 02:55:00 +0000

Welcome to the Connected Mom Sunday School. No matter what the course of your child's education, be it unschooling, homeschooling, or conventional schooling, The Connected Mom Sunday School aims to provide you with fun and easy activities for children of all ages and stages. Have an idea for a Connected Mom Sunday School activity or theme? Either comment below or send your idea to connectedmom (dot) julian (at) gmail (dot) com.)

A few weekends ago at a homeschool conference, I was privileged to hear a talk by Peter Gray, research professor of psychology at Boston College--and the author of one of my favorite education blogs. I had to duck out early due to a family concern, but not before I learned about a troubling trend: research has shown a steady increase in childhood anxiety and depression as opportunities for free play and expression have declined. Historically, kids have learned through self-directed interactions with their world. Is it possible that keeping them constantly busy with adult-directed activities contradicts their nature? Could we be unintentionally harming our children's emotional wellbeing?

With this fresh in my mind, I cannot bring myself to highlight structured activities. This week, I will not describe any specific project. Instead, here are some suggestions for facilitating child-directed play. Set up the opportunity, then sit back and marvel at where your child's imagination will go.

Toddler

Playing with Light

If you haven't checked out Play at Home Mom, I highly recommend it. These moms share all sorts of fun activities to expose your kids to new sensory experiences. One tool they often use is a light box or light panel. The simplest DIY version simply consists of a string of white Christmas lights inside a clear storage bin. You can see that light box, along instructions for a more complex version, at their website. Kids can use a light box with all sorts of small items; transparent or translucent items work really well. You might set out transparent building blocks, colored films, or jars of colored water. Now, you might ask "Isn't this activity parent-directed?" Not really. The moms lay out the activities in a way that attracts the childrens' attention--they call it an "invitation"--then they allow the kids room to experiment.

Preschooler

Busy Bags

Busy bags contain small, self-contained activities to occupy toddlers. Some activities may be more structured, such as tracing letters or matching colors. There's nothing wrong with that, but since this post focuses on child-directed play, I'll share a few of the more open-ended ideas:

About 20 twist ties in a small bottle: Kids can twist them, straighten them, build sculptures, or drop them one-by-one into the bottle.
Face feature magnets: Clip pictures of various facial expressions from magazines or from the Internet, stick them to magnetic sheets, and cut out. Store them in a small tin. Kids canuse them to make all sorts of silly faces.
Velcro shape sticks: Attach small pieces of velcro to the ends of several craft (popsicle) sticks. The original idea has you color code the sticks to form specific shapes. For a more freeform version, Iwould skip that part and let kids build whatever they can imagine.
Play dough and small cookie cutters.
Colored pasta or beads and string or pipe cleaners to string it on.

These are nice because you can throw them into your purse or diaper bag and pull them out at times when your toddler must sit and wait (at a restaurant, for example). The activities allow your toddler's mind to wander and play, even when his body cannot. If you really want to encourage free play, take two or three activities along and let your child choose one.

School-Age

Create Your Own Fantasy Land

With a few items from around the house, your child can create an imaginative setting for pretend play. Legos, boxes, or blocks become buildings. Use other household items to complete the landscape. A shallow bowl could make a lake or an oatmeal can a cave. Your child can act out any number of scenarios in his fantasy land using toy cars, animals, people. (This is one of many great ideas from Kathy Eugster. See the rest at her website.)

Older Child (10+)

Playing with Technology

Media seems to have an undeserved bad reputation when it comes to free play. But not all screen time is created equal. In fact, technology opens up all sorts of new creative avenues for kids to explore. Both Carnegie Mellon and MIT have developed simple programming languages (Alice and Scratch, respectively) especially for young people. Kids and teens can create their own interactive stories, simple computer games, and more. Programming not your child's thing? Maybe she'd like to produce a video. Set her loose with a cheap video camera, then allow her to edit the footage on the computer. Both Windows and Mac operating systems come standard with a video editor.