Leah Love

Pregnant Woman

Your Post Baby Body Changes

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A list of Post-Baby-Body Changes for Mom

 

• Hair loss.

My baby was about 3 months old when I realized that my temples were a bit farther back than I remembered.  I was losing my hair!  Horrified I scoured every available source I could find for information.  Usually at any given time up to 15% of your hair is in a ‘resting’ phase; which means it is about to fall out and be replenished.  Estrogen during pregnancy causes less ‘resting’ and thusly, less shedding.  After birth your estrogen levels fall and then so does your hair!  Be patient, your hair is supposed to return to its original glory in about a year.  At 9 months, I’m seeing some regrowth but I am not yet back to full.

 

• Sensitive Gums.

Another byproduct of pregnancy, apparently my gums have receded up over my k-nines, exposing the tooth closer to the root.  So now when I brush, or get food up in there, my tooth complains bitterly.  ‘They say that it will go back to normal after a while but I see no changes, boo!

 

• Weird breast changes.

My nipples will never be the same again I can tell you that!  I never had to think about them before but now that I’ve had a child they’re doing all sorts of strange things.  Like occasionally acting like giant white-heads.  Ew.

 

• Pain in back and hips.

It could just be that the ligaments holding my pelvic joints together are still stretched out from my body’s pre-birth preparations.  I’ve been told that it will dissipate, sooner if I find the time to strengthen my core.

 

• Swollen feet.

My feet have grown!  I could kick myself now because I knew women’s feet swelled and yet I still bought a brand new pair of shoes while I was pregnant.  Brand new and hardly worn, they’re sitting at the back of my closet until my feet decide to shrink down again… sigh.  It’s the pregnancy hormone Relaxin, the same hormone responsible for Pelvic Girdle Pain (the pain that can occur while the pelvis prepares for birth) that’s responsible for the loosening of the ligaments in my feet.  And *sob!* it’s permanent!  Even more horrifying?  My feet will keep getting bigger with every pregnancy!  If I take a walk on the beach people will be looking for Sasquatch.

 

• Paunch.

Were we really expecting it to go away?  Only starlets with money to burn can afford to get rid of their leftover tum flab.  I know I don’t have the available funds to hire my own personal trainer, so I’m afraid that my loosened abdominal muscles are just going to have to stay loosened.

 

• Stretch marks.

Purple-ish and plentiful and about 3 inches up over my belly button.

 

• Incontinence.

I’m blessedly free of this problem, but I do work with a woman who keeps extra undergarments in her trunk for accidents.  All it takes is one unexpected laugh or sneeze and she has a leak.  And this is a decade after her last baby!  If you are having continued trouble with incontinence don’t despair; solutions are only a doctor’s consultation away.

Phantom Crier Syndrome

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I used to hear it when I was younger, waaaaay before I was a mother.  I would babysit for my nieces and nephews a lot and I have specific memories of getting up and running to their rooms at the back of the house.  Instead of a squalling baby, a peacefully sleeping baby.  This happened at least twice a night.  It was maddening!

Baby CryingWe put our spare bed into the nursery when our son was born and I pretty much lived out of that room for the first 3-5 months, after that we wanted to break him of his 3 am feeding through Ferberization.  It wasn’t really until the 6 or 7th month that I realized I was still getting up.

I hear phantom crying!

The most disturbing thing is that when the baby monitor is shut off…  I can still hear sounds coming from it!  So much so that I’ll roll over in my sleep and pick it up to look at it, expecting to see its little lights blinking and, instead, finding that it isn’t even on!  And the baby is sound asleep.

Arrg!

Phantom Crier Syndrome

Am I crazy?  (My husband thinks I am.)  Is this some sort of new-mother-mania?  Am I disturbed, obsessed, defective?

The internet is not a lot of help, at least not scientifically, but there’s a lot of anecdotal information.  I guess the best that could be said is that women (and some men) do this out of a natural need to keep our children safe and alive.  It may sound a bit non-scienc-y for me to say it, but I think phantom crying was bred into us through the generations to make sure the species stays alive.

If I’m constantly checking on my baby because I think I hear him crying, I’m probably more likely to catch something else that goes wrong as it happens.  Like a blanket over my baby’s face.  So, while the phantom crying is annoying as heck, it’s also natural, and maybe even necessary!

Pregnancy and Hot Tubbing

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Two in a Hot TubIf you wish to be especially cruel to a pregnant woman, invite her to go hot tubbing.  Because you know she can’t.  But if she’s like me she may have to fight with herself, because who doesn’t want a muscle melting dip in the frothy hot waters of bliss? Sigh…

One woman I met was sitting in a hotel hot tub and casually talking about her brand new pregnancy to a grandmotherly lady across the way when the grandmotherly lady, upon hearing that the woman was pregnant, proceeded to force her out of the tub with cries of ‘You’re hard boiling your baby!’

Sure, it sounds a little ridiculous, the thought of your tiny little fetus suddenly congealing into a picnic snack.  Gack!  But is there some truth to that?  What is the danger?

Any activity that raises your core body temperature to 102.2 degrees or more can have terrible consequences for your fetus.  Whether from fever or from sitting outdoors in the sun,  especially in the first trimester when his little body is developing.  Research suggests that fetus’ exposed to abnormal temperatures are at risk of disrupted development of the brain and spine.  Elongated time in high-temperature environments could result in some of the following;

  • Spina Bifida, (occurs when the spinal column doesn’t close all the way.)
  • Damage to the central nervous system.
  • Eye problems such as cataract.
  • Abnormal smallness of the brain, (called Micrencephaly.)
  • Cleft palate
  • Heart defect
  • Mental retardation, autism, cerebral palsy, schizophrenia, etc…

All it takes to become hyperthermic (too hot) is 10 minutes in a hot tub or sauna, just 10 minutes!  So what can you do to make sure you keep your hot-tubbing lifestyle from getting out of control?

  • Always, always, consult your doctor’s advice.
  • Lower your hot tub temperature gauge to no hotter than 97-100 degrees.
  • If you cannot adjust the setting of a hot tub, take a warm bubble bath instead.
  • Avoid every-day use of the hot tub, once a week for no longer than 10 minutes should be sufficient.
  • Avoid submersion if you can by sitting safely on the edge of the tub and soaking your feet to the knee.
  • Recognize your internal warnings, if you are uncomfortable or dizzy, leave the hot tub area for someplace cooler.
  • And, again… always, always, consult your doctor’s advice!

The Truth about Stretch Marks

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I was big.  I mean B.I.G. big.  People were asking about multiples big.  According to my husband (because I couldn’t see them) I was cultivating my stretch marks well before the 5th month.  Long purplish striations that I didn’t know were there, until after I’d given birth that I got to see them, a good four inches above my belly button!  And I hadn’t even tried to stop them!

There are two camps that I know of so far as stretch marks are concerned.  The first camp say you can escape them so long as you slather creams night and day and the second camp says there’s genetics at play and you cannot escape them no matter what you do.  I belong to the second camp mostly.  My mother had them, I remember noticing them as a tot and asking her about them.  And if you’re five and remember your mother’s stretch marks… it doesn’t bode well for you.

You can reduce the likelihood of stretch marks by ;

  1. Having a mother who didn’t have them
  2. Not being fair skinned (I’m your typical pale Irish lass)
  3. Avoiding excessive weight gain (there’s a baby in here hel-LO!)
  4. Avoiding rapid weight loss (I just had a baby hel-LO!)
  5. Encouraging pigs to grow wings

So…  I don’t think I could have done anything to save myself.  The best I can tell you…  look at your mother.  Your mother is your best indicator if you are going to get them or not.  If it looks like good news, celebrate, if it looks like it’s not just be sure to thank her very much for her sacrifice and concentrate on the end game, your baby!  Good luck!

You might want to check out:  Products made to reduce stretch marks

Ye Olde pregnancy test

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Pregnancy TestModern pregnancy tests are amazingly convenient.  Unbox the stick, pee on the stick, re-cap stick, wait for the stick to indicate
pregnancy.  The entire process often takes no more than 5 minutes top to bottom!

I vaguely recall that the pregnancy tests of 10-20 years ago used to be rather inconvenient.  Involving cups and egg timers.  Ick.

If I’d have been born 1,000 BC, I’d have to pee on a sack of wheat and barley seed to find out if I were pregnant.  Then wait to see if they sprouted or not.  If no sprouts, no baby.  But the rule was if the wheat sprouted I’d have a girl, and if the barley sprouted then it was a boy.  Apparently they tested this theory in the early 60s and history was vindicated!  At least about the sprouting, it had something to do with the woman’s excess estrogen.

Around the same era, the Greeks found it perfectly normal to place bulb of garlic or onion into your womanly area overnight (gag!).  If your breath didn’t stink of onion the next morning, you were preggo!  Don’t ask me, I don’t get it either.

The next earliest test test, though it was hardly a viable home option, was the ‘Rabbit’ test, developed in 1927.  A woman’s urine was injected into a juvenile (female) rabbit, rat or mouse.  The poor baby animal was then euthanized a few days later and its ovaries dissected.  If ovulation was found to have been induced in the juvenile animals, the woman was pregnant.

People later moved onto African frogs, which are more humane because they, when injected with pregnant women’s pee, would just lay eggs so… no killing necessary.

The pregnancy test as we think of it was invented in the 1970’s as a two-hour long process. It called ‘Wampole’s two-hour pregnancy test.

The test kit consisted of; two test tubes, a plastic rack, a bottle of control solution, a bottle of hCG-antiserum and a bottle of cell suspension.  You provide your pipettes and centrifuge.  Ha!  Just kidding, you couldn’t take a pregnancy test at home yet, you had to take your ‘sample’ to a laboratory or doctor’s office.

In ’78, we get the EPT (Early Pregnancy Test) test that takes us from waiting in waiting rooms to waiting in bathrooms.

As at home pregnancy tests moved into the ‘80s and beyond, wait times are reduced, accuracy is increased with the introduction of digital pregnancy tests.  Ovulation kits are introduced into the mix.  What, do you suppose, will they come out with in the future?

 

Traveling with an Infant

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Our Infant TravelingThings to consider when traveling with an infant:

  • With a baby, you should stop every 2-3 hours anyway so take some time to map out the best places to stop.  I like to hit waysides and the local state visitor info centers, the last one I was at had a lovely paved walking path with lots of shady patches of lawn to let the baby crawl on.
  • If you’re traveling with another adult, one of you can attend to the baby while the other fills the gas tank or orders the food.
  • If you’re lucky enough to be traveling with another adult, that means there’ll be someone available to sit in the back seat, to distract a fussy baby.
  • A pacifier clip is an invaluable asset when trying to keep pacifier from the floor mats.  My baby is old enough to put it back in his mouth when he spits it out.
  • If you can, plan the trip around baby’s sleep schedule.  The easiest car trip I had was the one we started at night after bedtime.  He slept the entire time!

If driving at night is not an option, and you’re traveling alone with a car-crabby baby try these tips;

  • Turn the car radio to static and raise it to the general volume of his crying.  (It works with the vacuum cleaner when you’re at home!)
  • Keep an abundance of small, interesting, toys in the front seat with you and pass them back as he throws them over the side of the car seat.
  • Sing.  Sometimes the sound of your voice doing something like singing could be enough to make your crabby kid smile.
  • Open the windows.  A blasting of wind is often distracting, sometimes fun, to an irritated baby.
  • If there’s space for it, provide finger foods for distraction.

Play Dough Recipe

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Use this play dough recipe to make a fun dough that is cheap, and colorful!

homemade playdough for toddlersThings Needed:

1 Cup salt

1 ½ Cups flour

4 Tbsp. Olive Oil

4 Tsp. cream of tartar

¾ Cup tap water

Food Coloring

Storage containers such as; jam jars, baby food containers, etc.

Various kitchen utensils; rolling pins, cookie cutters, etc.

Vanilla, peppermint, almond are optional.  The same for any extract you can find down the baking aisle.  You can add them for their smell as much as for taste (and don’t think kids won’t put it in their mouth!)  This is not a time to use essential oils!

To Make:

Combine all ingredients (except the food coloring) adjust water/flour amounts to get a perfect consistency, squish together with your hands for best results, if you have toddlers they will love this step!

Now, grab a chunk of it and poke a little divot in the center with your finger. Put a few drops of food coloring in the indent, start with two.  Fold the dough until color is blended in to your satisfaction, be careful, it’ll stain your hands for a week!

Put dough in your containers and store wherever you like. If you see that the dough is drying out add a few drops of water until you’re back in the game. This dough will eventually go bad, but it’s easy to re-make. Woo, playtime!

Dealing with Cradle Cap

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A beautiful Baby

Photo Credit: Mr Miyagi via Compfight cc

Just in case you haven’t heard of it either I’ll run it down for you.  It’s a patchy, scaly, crusty thing that happens on a baby’s head usually in the first three months of life.  My son Frumpkin had it; it’s a little like stubborn dandruff and probably doesn’t bother the child as much as the parent looking for a way to stop it.

Use oil.  If you make your baby lotion, you might have some coconut oil if you don’t have any you can use regular Olive Oil on a baby’s scalp.  Rub it on and leave alone for a couple of hours.  Then wash off with your Castile soap and water foaming mixture (click here if you don’t know what I’m talking about).  Use a soft-bristled baby brush to exfoliate if you and your baby are comfortable with it.  Otherwise, you can sort of… flake it off with your fingers.  Lather rinse repeat as necessary.

Oat Sock:  Take a smallish sock from your drawer, push a handful of raw oatmeal inside and knot the sock tightly closed.  Run under warm water until damp and sort of ‘polish’ the baby’s head in a circular motion until you notice that the oats have turned ‘milky’.  It may form a lather.  The oats, as anyone with a memory of chicken pox can tell you, eases skin irritation and loosens the cradle cap. This can be brushed or flaked away later.

Or, like I did with my daughter Pumpkin…  ignore it.  It’s not harmful, and it will go away.