In other news sanitizing everything may negatively affect a child's developing immune system.

Yeah, I really need to hear this now on top of everything else...

"Don't eat cold cuts, they could contain listeria."
"Don't eat soft serve ice cream, see above."
"Don't eat soft cheese. Same reason."
"Don't drink caffeine. It can cause a miscarriage"
"Don't eat fish. It's polluted."
"Don't eat food cooked on the grill. The burnt parts are carcinogens."
"Drink lots of water. But don't drink out of #7 plastic bottles. They contain BPA."
"Don't take hot baths."
"Don't sleep on your back."

Etc...

/3 more months and then I'm having a giant slab of rare grilled steak with a gallon of coffee to wash it down.

RedSawyer90: Etc...

/3 more months and then I'm having a giant slab of rare grilled steak with a gallon of coffee to wash it down.

I hope you aren't reading "What to Expect When You're Expecting."

That book was so over the top.

BTW, your list? Bullshiat.

Moderation -- don't eat a can of tuna every day, and don't drink a pot of coffee everyday, etc.

Being born is the leading cause of death.

RedSawyer90: Yeah, I really need to hear this now on top of everything else...

"Don't eat cold cuts, they could contain listeria."
"Don't eat soft serve ice cream, see above."
"Don't eat soft cheese. Same reason."
"Don't drink caffeine. It can cause a miscarriage"
"Don't eat fish. It's polluted."
"Don't eat food cooked on the grill. The burnt parts are carcinogens."
"Drink lots of water. But don't drink out of #7 plastic bottles. They contain BPA."
"Don't take hot baths."
"Don't sleep on your back."

Etc...

/3 more months and then I'm having a giant slab of rare grilled steak with a gallon of coffee to wash it down.
.
.
.
What, no Martini? No Single Malt?

I wouldn't put too much stock into this right now. Scientists are pretty much stumped as to why there's been such a marked increase in allergies and asthma in recent decades. And that's across all demographics and regions.

Women watch too much Oprah and read too many pre-natal care books these days. Men, if you have a pregnant wife/girlfriend, slap her out of it.

If they knew how rudimentary the human diet has been for most of our history, until recently, their jaws would drop in disbelief.
And yet, the human race survived somehow.

joeshlabotnik: Being born is the leading cause of death.

I enjoyed

michaeld5:
If they knew how rudimentary the human diet has been for most of our history, until recently, their jaws would drop in disbelief.
And yet, the human race survived somehow.

Well, the average life-span was about 40 y/o until the last century.

And have you seen photos of people back a hundred and so years ago? They weren't exactly built like Greek olympians.

moralpanic: I wouldn't put too much stock into this right now. Scientists are pretty much stumped as to why there's been such a marked increase in allergies and asthma in recent decades. And that's across all demographics and regions.

Yeah -- but when I was pregnant I thought the pregnancy vitamins were overkill. I didn't feel quite right after taking them, and I stopped.

Another side effect of high doses of iron as I discovered last night. I have been taking twice the amount pregnant women take due to anemia. I ended up passing out last night because of dehydration. ER instead of the main course of my dinner-really irritating. ER doctor take more iron drink more water. Iron is a tricky little devil I tell ya.

Yeah, RedSawyer90's list is a bit on the restrictive side. I'm a fam med physician (delivered babies in residency) and my wife's almost 16 weeks along. We talked with her OBGYN about those issues. He said he'd never even seen a case of listeria in pregnancy outside of a textbook and didn't make any restrictions on lunchmeat (I had been keeping her from eating it). Caffeine, as limited as possible. Fish? Limit the stuff that tends to have some mercury in it (salmon, etc.). Food from the grill? That's a new one. To my knowledge, it's only dangerous to your own colon over many years. You can tell my wife she can't have her steak, I'm not. Hot baths? Tricky as heat can cause problems, but it usually has to get "hot tub hot" to do anything. Don't sleep on your back? Good luck sleeping on your stomach.

He also told us to stay away from the What to Expect When You're Expecting book.

therabbitofcaerbannog: He also told us to stay away from the What to Expect When You're Expecting book.

Glad to hear it.

My OB/GYN said a cup of coffee (or tea) a day was okay. For my third, this was a big help, just to make it through the day. For my first two, I cut out caffeine.

therabbitofcaerbannog: Don't sleep on your back? Good luck sleeping on your stomach.


I was told to always, always, always sleep on my left side during pregnancy, as this provided the best blood flow to the baby. Kinda hard to remain that way when you toss and turn in your sleep.

/was also told to avoid peanut butter during pregnancy
//FARK that
///14-pound 2.5 month old so far doing OK

Remember 20 years ago when Superman had that commercial where he'd appear at a live action little league game, and offer some kid with asthma a pack of asthma-safe crappy cardboard games?

I have always imagined that everyday was a rainy day for kids with asthma. With that in mind, and in true Superman form, I offer these Rainyday fun activities for kids! (new window)

As an anemic male who takes pre-natal vitamins, I'm getting a kick out of this.

/If only I could feel my legs.

I ate and drank what I wanted during pregnancy (but I wasnt boozing it up or drinking cow blood) and didn't take prenatal vitamins and my kid turned out fine.

michaeld5: Women watch too much Oprah and read too many pre-natal care books these days. Men, if you have a pregnant wife/girlfriend, slap her out of it.



Out of the books or out of the baby?

moralpanic: I wouldn't put too much stock into this right now. Scientists are pretty much stumped as to why there's been such a marked increase in allergies and asthma in recent decades. And that's across all demographics and regions.

This, and spina bifida is real man. No meningocele for meand my kids thank you very much. I prefer my neural tube fully closed.

Crap!

I take prenatal vitamins but Im not pregnant...

Anyone know if this can screw things up for later? :(!

Minerva8918: I take prenatal vitamins but Im not pregnant...

Why are you taking them???

therabbitofcaerbannog: Don't sleep on your back? Good luck sleeping on your stomach.

Early on you can't even tell,but as the kid gets bigger, it WILL be uncomfortable to sleep on anything but your side, preferably the left one. First, the lower back is going to be stressed from the day's movements anyway, and second the kid will be smushing on the kidneys and spine in addition to the major blood vessels; when I had an ultrasound in the 7th month it was a special circle of hell all its own to lie on my back just for the scan. "What do you mean you don't have extra pillows for my legs? I'm PREGNANT."

I gave up caffeine, I hate lunch meat, but for the most part, I actually added a little fish (nothing exotic or too local) and I think I missed the prenatals a couple times a week, but I did take iron pretty much daily. I did take a few warm baths at the beginning of the 2nd trimester (hotel maid-cleaned bathtub ftw) but I haven't had one since.

It was all a breeze compared to giving up chocolate so she wouldn't be affected while breastfeeding.

Every once in a while she claims she loves me more than I love her. "No, honey. I gave up CHOCOLATE for you."

Don't know if prenatal vitamins were to blame.

ExJerseyGirl: Minerva8918: I take prenatal vitamins but Im not pregnant...

Why are you taking them???

Because the average/normal American diet is often low in Folic Acid, iron and other vitamins? Because many women don't realize they're knocked up until multiple weeks after conception? Or because the vitamins are good for the hostess body too?

st.theresa: It was all a breeze compared to giving up chocolate so she wouldn't be affected while breastfeeding.

Say what?

I take them for the health benefits...

In other countries they don't have as many restrictions as they have in the US when you are pregnant; my mother kept asking me why I couldn't eat the things I wasn't eating and then asking her doctor over in Spain and he would say "seems like they are a bit too worried", I think your society is a bit obsessive with things. Moderation is best.


Spain and Venezuela have very few restrictions in pregnancy (if at all) and although I have no clue if the level of mortality is higher or lower in comparison, I do know that when I lived there, in neither of them I saw/heard or met people with an allergy to peanuts or nuts in general, I actually learned about such allergy when I moved to the US 6 years ago and I was pretty amazed.

I take prenatal vitamins but Im not pregnant...


I would still strongly recommend taking prenatal vitamins if you are pregnant or thinking about getting pregnant. This is some pretty fringe research and not to be taken as fact for humans by any means. We KNOW a deficiency of folic acid (in prenatal vitamins) increases the risk of neural tube defects. They THINK, that MAYBE it increases the risk of asthma in mice.

ExJerseyGirl: st.theresa: It was all a breeze compared to giving up chocolate so she wouldn't be affected while breastfeeding.

Say what?

Not sure if it was the caffeine or the dairy in milk chocolate, or maybe it was just the three-week-colic kickoff, but shortly after valentine's day, she decided to stop sleeping and just CRY for up to 8 hours a night.

That sucked.
I gave up chocolate, and that helped just a little. A couple months later, she finally mellowed out.

/3 more months and then I'm having a giant slab of rare grilled steak with a gallon of coffee to wash it down.
.
.
.
What, no Martini? No Single Malt?

I have 5 more months and all I'm drinking is beer for a month after that. O'Douls sucks so much. I can't figure out what to do with the extra 5 bottles.

I still drink coffee though. I just don't drink a lot. And I don't like tuna, don't really have the stomach for soft cheese...and I'm gluten intolerant, so I can't put it on bread or anything. I hate those "don't" lists. But..I'm also hormonal. I hate a lot of things right now.

Im a picky eater, and I want to make sure I get the supplements I need. Since Im young (20) and married, even though Im on birth control, its not something I take for granted. There is always the 1% of women who get pregnant, and although its extremely unlikely, I figure better be safe than sorry.

And it makes my hair and nails preeety!

ExJerseyGirl: BTW, your list? Bullshiat.

I think she's speaking more to the crap that every single passerby feels the need to tell you. I've seriously had check-out people lecture me for buying deli meat. Everyone is a freaking expert.

RedSawyer90, when are you due? I've got just under 3 months to go myself (12/10).

kittypoo: I think your society is a bit obsessive with things. Moderation is best.

Let us introduce you to the wonderful world of Malpractice Insurance guidelines.

Early on you can't even tell,but as the kid gets bigger, it WILL be uncomfortable to sleep on anything but your side

Heh heh. Very true. I was thinking more of the safety issue, but I can definitely see how sleeping with a bowling ball on your stomach could be uncomfortable. My wife is not looking forward to that at all.

Minerva8918: I take them for the health benefits...

Which are?

I am curious, not saying it is a bad thing. I just worried that they were too much, and made sure I had a healthy diet when I was pregnant. I would never consider taking them now -- I assume my body is going to process vitamins differently from a pill than from foods that provide them and that the pregnancy vitamins might havew too much of stuff I don't need right now.

Not to threadjack, but it's kind of on topic. For those of you with kids already, does anyone know of a good website for reviewing baby related gear (bottles, carseats, etc)? I know nothing of the consumer side of this stuff and everybody has opinions.

therabbitofcaerbannog: Early on you can't even tell,but as the kid gets bigger, it WILL be uncomfortable to sleep on anything but your side

Heh heh. Very true. I was thinking more of the safety issue, but I can definitely see how sleeping with a bowling ball on your stomach could be uncomfortable. My wife is not looking forward to that at all.

Crazy suggestion: for me, it helped to sleep on the couch. I liked being able to press my back against the back of the couch, or being able to sandwich a bag of soon-to-be-not-frozen veggies between my back and the couch when the sciatica came along.

ExJerseyGirl

Link (new window)

or just google "prenatal vitamins not pregnant" and you'll get plenty of stuff.

Stacked Librarian: I think she's speaking more to the crap that every single passerby feels the need to tell you.

Yes, I realized that. I was just pointing out that I thought all that advice was BS.

therabbitofcaerbannog: Not to threadjack, but it's kind of on topic. For those of you with kids already, does anyone know of a good website for reviewing baby related gear (bottles, carseats, etc)? I know nothing of the consumer side of this stuff and everybody has opinions.

I didn't have any cash when I was preggers so I didn't do a lot of shopping, but as you do find sites out there, think hard about what you see yourself using before you go crazy for the highest end or what your friends use. I carried my kid in my arms all the time and didn't use a "carrier" or whatever they call them, and the one time we tried using the carseat as a babyseat in a restaurant, it was a huge fiasco. Also see if you can check the stuff out in real life either at a store or try a friend's -- the Baby Bjorn we had was such a freaky contraption I used it like 3 times -- fourth trimester is not a time to experiment with baby physics and intricate gizmos.

good good good luck!!!!

Ah dammit, another media scare story. Do you think they report on experiments on how growth hormone is implicated in bone development? But HINT at some vaguely possible unproven hazard to pregnant women and they're all over it. I understand that sensational headlines get eyeballs, but I hoped for something more honest and responsible from some publication called New Scientist.

Looking though the website it seems to be leaning to the hysterical side especially with the environmental reports although the space page seems decent. I'll skip it though, I hate these pointless scare stories.

therabbitofcaerbannog, try Amazon.com for reviews...that's what I do. Or I just google whatever product "x product reviews"!

therabbitofcaerbannog
Not to threadjack, but it's kind of on topic. For those of you with kids already, does anyone know of a good website for reviewing baby related gear (bottles, carseats, etc)? I know nothing of the consumer side of this stuff and everybody has opinions.

We were in the dark about things when we first had kids. I didn't even know where to start getting stuff. Like, when do you buy diapers/clothes/stuff? My husband used Consumer Reports. (http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/index.htm) That's how we found Graco stuff, and Britax car seats. I've always found Avent bottles and breast pumps to be really great as well. For baby carriers, I let my husband pick it. He chose Baby Bjorn, because it was comfortable, secure, black and he could hang his HAM radios on the side *shrug* We all have needs :)

Babies R Us has really good selections of good brands. Good luck :)

therabbitofcaerbannog: baby related gear (bottles...)

If your wife has boobies, you won't need 'em. Unless you're adopting. Either way, congrats.

This shiat isn't even out of the mouse stage yet. Why do the (unqualified) media report on every (preliminary, useless, insignificant) study out there? Oh... headlines like these sell papers... I furgot...

Thanks much. It's weird, I've taken care of babies on the medical side of it, but I find myself being irrationally terrified that if I get the wrong brand of passifier my child will be a serial killer. I'm trying desperately to keep a level head and not be "one of those" parents. We're also trying to take the minimalist approach and pack light, we'll see how that goes.

mmagdalene: therabbitofcaerbannog: baby related gear (bottles...)

If your wife has boobies, you won't need 'em. Unless you're adopting. Either way, congrats.

If your wife has boobies and is staying home and tethered to the kid, you won't need 'em, but they make things a lot more convenient if she needs to go to the dentist or job interviews or work. Breast pumps ftw.

/psa: IF YOU'RE PREGNANT, get yourself to the dentist. You may not be able to get the full run of xrays but even a decent cleaning could be a very good thing, since pregnancy can cause havoc with oral bacteria, blood supply, etc., and any dental disease can introduce funky bacteria into your shared bloodstream. Very small preemptive suggestion; most women do this anyway, but our insurance was screwed up until just before the kid was born. One month after she was born, I had a root canal. The infection may have explained the white count differential my doctor was baffled by when I was giving birth.

mmagdalene
therabbitofcaerbannog: baby related gear (bottles...)

If your wife has boobies, you won't need 'em. Unless you're adopting. Either way, congrats.


We used bottles for water and pumping milk, to encourage more milk production (we had hungry kids). Also good for when mom leaves the house and dad needs to feed the child while she's gone. It also helps the little one develop hand coordination and muscles.

The ways we find to stress ourselves out about babies and birth and childrearing always amaze me.

Babies are pretty resilient...so are embryos and fetuses. As long as you're not ingesting bottles of lysol or inhaling burning rubber fumes, relax.

Really. Relax.

Babies come in their own time, they grow well naturally, they are born knowing how to nurse (even if we have to learn how as the mom!) and really, if you carry your baby and sleep with your baby, there's no "gear" to buy.

Don't slice 'em and dice 'em when they're born, no risk of infection. Don't poke 'em and prod 'em with needles, no risk of reactions. Give homebirth a try, no risk of episiotomies, unwanted c-sections, extra people doing stuff to you or your baby that you didn't want done.

I'm one of the most granola people I know, and I still have a glass of wine now and then when I'm pregnant. Making womens' bodies some sort of battleground for pregnancy advice only benefits the scaremongers who publish those damned books.

Listen to your body, eat a variety of healthy foods, don't binge on drink, get some excercise, and relax.

Remember to breathe in. Breathe out.

therabbitofcaerbannog: Yeah, RedSawyer90's list is a bit on the restrictive side. I'm a fam med physician (delivered babies in residency) and my wife's almost 16 weeks along. We talked with her OBGYN about those issues. He said he'd never even seen a case of listeria in pregnancy outside of a textbook and didn't make any restrictions on lunchmeat (I had been keeping her from eating it). Caffeine, as limited as possible. Fish? Limit the stuff that tends to have some mercury in it (salmon, etc.). Food from the grill? That's a new one. To my knowledge, it's only dangerous to your own colon over many years. You can tell my wife she can't have her steak, I'm not. Hot baths? Tricky as heat can cause problems, but it usually has to get "hot tub hot" to do anything. Don't sleep on your back? Good luck sleeping on your stomach.

He also told us to stay away from the What to Expect When You're Expecting book.

A pregnant woman is twenty times more susceptible to Listeria than a non-pregnant woman. Also, it can kill the baby. That's why doctors don't want you to eat deli meat.

It's only nine months without deli meat. You'll get over it.