A free, monthly newsletter with a roundup of the best the internet has to offer about mom-to-be and baby.

Pregnancy

7 Reasons Not to Find Out the Sex of the Baby

As the big day drew near for both of my sons’ births, I was going nuts with anticipation and excitement. Excitement about adding to our family and becoming a dad, for sure, but also because I was finally going to get the answer to a very important question — are we having a boy or a girl? Yup, that’s right. We didn’t find out. That’s a decision that has drawn some mixed reactions and opinions to say the least, but it’s one my wife and I stand behind 100 percent.

10 Healthy Pregnancy Tips

10 great tips to ensure that you have the healthiest pregnancy possible.

Birth

Comfort in labour. How you can help yourself to a normal satisfying childbirth.

Jan’s Birth Story – Jan, a first-time mother, accompanied by her partner, Jim, and her doula, Molly, gave birth to little Keenan after 18 hours of labour. Jan and Jim had taken childbirth classes that explored the emotions of labour, ways to maximize Jan’s comfort and well-being, and various approaches to care during labour. Because Jan felt confident that birth is a normal though intense process, she trusted that her body and her inner strength would enable her to labour and give birth normally.

How to Reduce Epidurals by 65% and Caesareans by 44%

It has been about a year since a study out of Australia about childbirth education generated news reports around the world. In a randomized controlled trial (RCT), researchers at Western Sydney University compared outcomes of women who attended usual hospital childbirth classes to those attending usual hospital classes plus a specialized childbirth education program focusing on complementary pain management strategies, known as the Complementary Therapies for Labour and Birth protocol or CTLB. Remarkably, the researchers found that women who attended the CTLB course had a 65% lower epidural rate and a 44% lower caesarean rate. In this day and age when many hospitals are striving to reduce caesarean rates, how did they do it?

Breastfeeding

Birth and breastfeeding – the domino effect

Most new mothers plan to breastfeed their babies and, according to the South African Demographic and Health Survey of 1998, approximately 88% of mothers initiated breastfeeding at birth. However, only 10% of babies were breastfed exclusively in the first three months of life, with less than 8% reaching the 6 month mark. This makes South Africa one of the countries with the lowest breastfeeding rates in the world. Increasingly research is showing that the birth option a woman chooses and the way births are conducted influence breastfeeding. Many women don’t realise this; in fact, many do not prepare for breastfeeding at all, assuming that it is something that will come naturally. Let’s take a closer look at what this means in practice.

Skin to Skin

Skin to skin for mom and baby at birth and beyond

Benefits of skin to skin

Parenting

After the Birth, what a family needs

“Let me know if I can help you in any way when the baby is born.” … “Just let me know if you need a hand.” … “Anything I can do, just give me a call.” Most pregnant women get these statements from friends and family but shy away from making requests when they are up to their ears in dirty laundry, unmade beds, dust bunnies and countertops crowded with dirty dishes.

Types of Parenting Styles and How to Identify Yours

In psychology today, there are four major recognized parenting styles: authoritative, neglectful, permissive, and authoritarian. Each one carries different characteristics and brings about different reactions in the children which they are used on. It is important to keep in mind that every parent child relationship is different, so there is not one sure fire way to go about parenting. This is a simple guide to help decode your parenting style and provide general suggestions on how to raise a happy, responsible, productive member of society.

Inspiration

Healing Birth, Healing the Earth

Birth, she is dying. This primal and unspeakably powerful initiation, the only road to motherhood for our ancestors, has been stripped of her dignity and purpose in our times. Birth has become a dangerous medical disease to be treated with escalating levels, and types, of technological interventions. What is worse perhaps is that the ecstasy of Birth- her capacity to take us outside (ec) our usual state (stasis)- has been forgotten, and we are entering the sacred domain of motherhood post-operatively, even post-traumatically, rather than transformationally.

Humour

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