Don’t Clip Their Wings…

Rutu Modan NYT

This picture in the NYT on Sunday struck a chord with me—it’s heartbreaking.  There are 3 million children being medicated for Attention Deficit Disorder in the United States today.  The long term effect of ritalin is not known.  And the short term benefits are questionable. Medicating children is too easy today and intuitively it seems wrong.  Children act out and sometimes the most distracted child is the most creative.  As parents, it is our responsibility to research and exhaust all avenues before we give a child a mind altering drug.

The Art of Distraction…that of drift and dream; of looking out for interest; of following this or that because it seems alive — Ritalin and other forms of enforcement and psychological policing are the contemporary equivalent of the old practice of tying up children’s hands in bed, so they won’t touch their genitals. The parent stupefies the child for the parent’s good. There is more to this than keeping out the interesting: there is the fantasy and terror that someone here will become pleasure’s victim, disappearing into a spiral of enjoyment from which he or she will not return.

Three Million Children Medicated!

Ritalin Gone Wrong by L. Alan Schoufe NYT 

THREE million children in this country take drugs for problems in focusing.

But are these drugs really helping children? Should we really keep expanding the number of prescriptions filled?

In 30 years there has been a twentyfold increase in the consumption of drugs for attention-deficit disorder.

As a psychologist who has been studying the development of troubled children for more than 40 years, I believe we should be asking why we rely so heavily on these drugs.

Attention-deficit drugs increase concentration in the short term, which is why they work so well for college students cramming for exams. But when given to children over long periods of time, they neither improve school achievement nor reduce behavior problems. The drugs can also have serious side effects, including stunting growth…

Joseph Paterno…

Paterno has said, “In hindsight, I wish I had done more.”

Breastfeeding Is Best For You and Your Baby…

Decreasing cancer risks for mother…this has been known for years and it’s about time we hear this fact again!

Nature’s Perfect Food

Picasso

A mother and her baby are bonded by the closest possible  human relationship—-for nine months they are almost one person.  The mother’s body supplying everything needed for her baby to grow.  There is an intense unspoken communication that exists, her baby knows her voice and her scent. Once her baby is born this bond continues, as her body manufactures milk specifically for her child, even if her baby is premature or sick.   As her baby grows, the breast milk changes, adapting to the changing needs of her baby.

As important as breast milk is for the baby’s optimum development, the act of caressing your baby while nursing is as important.  This feeling of closeness and connection is incomparable and lasting for both mother and child.

The important first two years of life…

From the first moment a baby enters this world they are communicating with their eyes, their bodies and their cries. How parents respond to their child  for the first two years have a huge affect on their emotional, physical and mental well being.  Jonathan Cohn explains why  in this important article, The Two Year Window.

Children, our most vulnerable citizens, are given short shrift in our society.  More money and support is targeted toward the elderly than children.

Follow up article by Jonathan Cohn tackles day care in the US.

Birth

“What normally causes labor to begin?” Although the complex process that causes labor to begin is not fully understood, researchers believe that the most important trigger is a surge of hormones released by the fetus. This hormone surge, which prepares the lungs and digestive system for life outside the womb, signals the fetus’s readiness for birth. In response to these signals, hormone receptors in the woman’s uterus turn on and the muscles in her uterus change to allow her cervix, at the lower end of her uterus, to open. In short, when a woman goes into labor on her own, this is a powerful signal that her baby is ready to be born and that her body is ready for labor.  After intense labor contractions,the mother pushes her baby into the world, she then warms and nourishes her baby at her breast.

A picture perfect delivery, but all too rare in today’s world of childbirth.

Cesarean sections, which are meant to be used when the life of the mother and baby are at risk, now make up 34% of the deliveries in the US, the norm should be 5-10%. Scheduled C-sections before a woman’s due date are a trend.  Also, labor intervention such as labor induction when cervix is not soft and ready, continuous electronic monitoring and an epidural in the early stages of  labor, all increase the likelihood of a cesarean.

 Dr. Alan Fleischman, president of the March of Dimes , says that women need to understand how important it is for a baby to go to term.  “Fetuses are not just getting fatter in the last month.  They are growing and developing.  Their lungs and brains and kidneys are developing.”

A vaginal delivery at term is best for the mother and best for the baby.  A woman’s ability to give birth should be nurtured and supported.  It is after all, the miracle of  miracles, the ability to bring another human being into the world.