The Mom Crowd

Last night I co-hosted a baby shower for my sweet friend, Rachel. Our theme: Eat Like a Pregnant Lady!

We had all of Rachel’s favorite foods which included: four different kinds of pizza, caesar salad, and a variety of drinks. For dessert we had freshly backed chocolate chips cookies straight from the oven. We also had vanilla ice cream, Reese’s shell, chocolate sauce, caramel, strawberry sauce, bananas, chocolate chips, whipped cream, and nuts. Basically any topping you could ever want on ice cream.

We were so full at the end of the night, but it was a lot of fun. This gluttony of food may not be the best idea for every shower, but it was certainly fun to “eat like a pregnant lady” for one night. The recipient also had fun too!

When I was pregnant with my second baby I wondered if I should have a baby shower or even register at a store. A part of me wanted this second baby “off the grid,” because Babies R Us likes to sell your information to marketers. According to “Parenting, Inc.” by Pamela Paul,  baby showers for second children have become more prevalent in recent years, because of big box stores and baby registries.

Some people think that if you already had one baby, then you already have everything you need to for the second one. Another baby shower could give the impression that you are greedy. Baby showers for a second baby or even a third and fourth can be completely appropriate, here is why:

• Every life is worth celebrating! Every baby is significant and birthing them is no easy task! It is important to celebrate the mother, the new baby’s family and baby. A new arrival is always exciting.

• Baby showers can be fun if the new baby is a different gender from his or her siblings. My friend Natalie had a shower for her first baby girl after having one son. It was a lot of fun to go overboard with the pink, bows, and dresses. She was very excited to be having a baby girl. It was quite the celebration!

• Sometimes you do need new baby items. Practically every baby needs diapers. You can shower second time parents with diapers or cards with money to buy cloth diapers.

• Baby showers can be anything you want them to be. There is more freedom to have a non-traditional baby shower with your second baby. You can have a BBQ with the guys attending or a girls night with desserts. I like the girls night out, because you can leave the kids at home with daddy.

• Have a shower and collect gifts for a local shelter. Let guests know that a shower is being held in your honor and gifts will be given to a local shelter. You can collect diapers and baby clothes for a crisis center in your area.

Baby showers are to celebrate the mother and the new baby. I think we all should be celebrated with each baby we have! How you get showered is up to you.

Did you have a baby shower for your second and third children?

-photo courtesy of rshannonsmith

I should be drinking whole milk while I’m pregnant?  And better than that is unpasteurized, raw milk?

I should stay away from a low-fat diet? Especially while I’m pregnant?

What is “carbage”?

It’s okay to feed my baby meat?

So, can I or can’t I eat fish while I’m pregnant?

Industrial fats like corn, sunflower, safflower, and soybean oil are making me fat and causing heart disease and diabetes?  You mean butter, coconut oil, and lard are better choices?

What foods are good to introduce to my baby?

You mean babies don’t NEED cereal when they first start eating? Are you crazy?

I recently read Nina Planck’s book Real Food: What to Eat and Why based on the recommendation of a friend. Thanks Heather!  She also recommended Planck’s next book, Real Food For Mother and Baby.  When she told me that the book explains why mothers need more than iron and folic acid when they are pregnant and even trying to conceive a baby my interest was piqued.

This book will turn many of your thoughts about food upside down.  Nina is aon a mission to help people understand why it is important to eat “real food”.  Real food is food that people have been eating for thousands of years.  The kind of food that is minimally processed–meaning milk that comes straight from the cow, beef that is fed grass not soybeans and corn, grains that have been soaked, plain yogurt with your own added flavor, poultry that is allowed to roam and eat grass and bugs.  You get the idea.  Planck makes the argument that “industrial foods” are ruining our health.  Soybean, corn, safflower, and sunflower oils are commonly added into our foods.  They are also highly processed and increasing our bad cholesterol.  The information in this book will make your head spin because it demystifies so much of our wrong thinking about food.

This book addresses all those questions I wrote above. The first chapter is basically a summary of her first book Real Food.  I highly recommend reading her first book to get more of the science and information behind her food recommendations. It is eye opening.  Chapters 2 and 3 deal with pregnancy and nutrition during pregnancy.  Chapter 4 covers breastfeeding. This chapter may make your eyes get as big as saucers in some parts but it is interesting all the same.  She covers why breastmilk is best for baby, what she would do if she had trouble nursing her baby, how formula is made, some of the basics of getting baby to breastfeed and even some anthropological implications for why we have to nurse so often.  Chapter 5 covers first foods for your baby.  This chapter has seriously made me rethink how I want to introduce foods to any additional children we may have.

This book, along with her first book, has caused me to reconsider the kind of foods I want our family to eat.  One thing that I really appreciate about her approach is that she recognizes that eating a traditional, REAL FOOD diet can be pricey.  Time magazine just had an article covering the benefits of grass fed beef for farms, farmers, and consumers.  The article showed how it is cheaper to buy  unhealthy, industrial food than healthy, traditional foods. Many of us are on strict budgets and have difficulty paying for free range chicken and grass fed beed for every meal.  She encourages people to pick and choose wisely and get the best that you CAN afford.  Can’t find raw milk?  Then buy organic whole milk.  Can’t afford organic?  Then at least drink whole milk.  She does recommend that we stay away from all foods that come with industrial indredients and not to fall prey to marketing schemes that tell us that processed foods are good for us.

When we get to England I am planning on implementing several things in the books I have been reading in the last few months about food.  One thing I want to do is avoid ALL forms of industrial food: corn oil, high fructose corn syrup, soybean oil, white flours, processed grains, powdered skim milk…you get the idea.  It seems almost impossible but I’d like to try it for at least a week and see how we do.  I figure since we are moving to a different country it might be easier to stop buying some of our industrial food culprits.

Other books I’ve been reading on the topic of Real Food:

The Omnivore’s Dilemna

Nourishing Traditions

Real Food: What to Eat and Why

Have you read this book?  What do you think?  Does the idea of drinking whole (raw) milk freak you out? Eating whole, unprocessed, real, traditional foods has been getting a lot more press recently.  What have you heard?

It’s been a while since I’ve been pregnant, 20 months in fact, but the uncertainties of pregnancy still run through my mind often.  While some women seem to breeze through pregnancy without so much as a single Braxton Hicks contraction, others, like me, are not so lucky.  I’ve been trying to think of some pithy way to express my confusion about the wonders of pregnancy but decided that the best way to do it is just to make two lists… one with the things that just plain stink about pregnancy and one with all the wonderment and joys of it.  As a preface, let me just say that I am one of those people who absolutely loves being pregnant and wishes it could be a perpetual state, but even I have my limits!

The Woes I Did Not Know:

- Morning Sickness can be such a misnomer!  Our first successful pregnancy proved to be very challenging as I dealt with “morning, mid-morning, noon, afternoon, evening, night sickness”.  I had developed a condition many women do not know about called Hyperemesis Gravidarum.  It is a very severe form of morning sickness in which those affected vomit constantly, find no relief and lose 5% or more of their body weight.  I lost 20 pounds in  my first trimester and had to be hospitalized.  I suffered with this condition my entire pregnancy.  Talk about rough!

- Joint pain is real in pregnancy!  With Andrew, I didn’t experience this at all, but early in my second trimester with Catherine, my hips burned with arthritis type pain.  It would be so severe some nights that I would toss and turn and never be able to find a comfortable position.  I also did not know that this condition can hang around for many months after pregnancy as well. 

- Constipation is 10 times worse when you are pregnant!  Because your body produces extra progesterone during pregnancy, it also increases the effects of the hormone in your system.  Progesterone slows down digestion, thus making constipation more likely.  Constipation is also more difficult to treat during pregnancy.  The only things I could do to relieve mine was drink decaf coffee, eat a ton of grapes and drink plenty of water.  And when it got really bad, I had to use glycerin suppositories.  Not exactly a glamorous moment!

- Induction is not all it’s cracked up to be!  I was induced with Andrew because I was making absolutely no progress on my own.  Even my doctor thought Andrew would be happy just to stay in my belly permanently.  The first few hours of my induction weren’t too bad, but after the fifth hour, the pain was completely intolerable and by the ninth hour, Andrew could not handle the stress from the drugs and I was rushed into emergency surgery for a c-section.  What I thought was to be a great experience turned into a scary day when my baby’s heartbeat could not be found and a vaginal delivery was no longer an option.

The Little Things I Enjoyed:

- The feeling of my children moving in my belly was the coolest thing ever!  I would lay on my couch, watching American Idol, just feeling Andrew groove to the music in my belly.  I loved that feeling and missed it once I gave birth.

- Being pregnant made me feel more beautiful than I ever felt in my life!  To this day, I miss my baby bump.  I always felt that pregnancy was one of God’s most beautiful creations and seeing pregnant bellies, especially mine, confirms that in my heart!  I never felt fat, just that I looked more feminine and beautiful than ever before.

- Shopping for baby stuff was more fun than shopping for anything I ever wanted for myself!  I didn’t feel like paying $180 for a crib bedding set was ridiculous, when if it was something I wanted, I never would have even considered it. 

- Getting to hold my children in my arms after they were born was one of the most fulfilling and awesome moments of my life!  Seeing their cute little noses, long eyelashes and full heads of hair was such an amazing experience. 

Of course, there were many other things that I loved about being pregnant… well, I actually even loved throwing up because it meant I was still pregnant, but all that said, pregnancy can be easy or difficult, but it’s ALWAYS worth it!!! 

What were some of the things you wish you had known about pregnancy?  Were there more unexpected “woes” or “joys” for you?

Photo Courtesy of otzberg

On Wednesday, Christy posted about secondary infertility.  It was a deeply personal topic for her and one that greatly encouraged others.  I was encouraged by Christy’s gentle reminders of what to say (and what not to say) if I ever find myself conversing with a friend in that position.  Thank you, Christy (and dear readers)!

Ironically, Wednesday was also the day that one of my friends began the in vitro fertilization process for the first time.  I will call this friend Allison.  Naturally, my heart thought of Allison and her husband as I read Christy’s words.  Infertility has long been their battle, and IVF is a huge step for them. 

One thing I love about my friendship with Allison is that we are completely different from one another.  She’s an introvert; I am not.  She is an engineer; I most definitely am not.  She is hard to get to know; I am not.  She doesn’t like “The Office” (and oh, how I do).  You get the idea.  I think it is from sheer perseverance on both our parts that we have become close at all. 

It was nearly a year into our friendship when she revealed to me the depth of her sadness about wanting to become a mother.  I had always wondered why this fantastic couple didn’t have children, but I didn’t want to pry.  The day Allison started to open up to me, I felt that she was handing me a fragile part of her heart, and I needed to care for it responsibly.  I can recall few times when I have been so cautious with my words. 

Allison and her husband talk with others about their infertility issues as little as possible.  They don’t like being asked, on a regular basis, about “how things are going” or “pregnant yet?”  They know their friends and family have the best of intentions, but the constant questioning irritates and saddens them.  They have even refrained from telling certain family members about the IVF process, as a measure of emotional protection for themselves.  Not only do they dislike having to give detailed updates on a regular basis, they feel they are disappointing others when nothing changes.  They are so consumed with their own worry, the idea of letting too many others in on it would put even more on their shoulders.

Over the past several months, I have learned from Allison that she desires prayer and concern from others, but she doesn’t want conversations to revolve solely around her infertility.  She desires her friends to check in occasionally.  To ask first if it’s something she is up to talking about.  To give hugs generously and to use words sparingly. 

These are lessons I think a lot of us well-meaning mothers could use.  I hope Allison’s story will give you strength to support someone you love in a similar situation.

Have you ever been on either side of this process, either as the friend or the woman pursuing IVF?  What were the challenges you faced in relating to the other?  Is there a right thing to say?

photo courtesy greekadman