Love-Knowledge Baby

I found a wonderful blog post about a pregnant woman’s right NOT to be pushed.  The author goes into various scenarios and sums up the right of parents to make gaurdianship chices for their children, including a pregnant woman’s right to consent or decline any treatments.  Her last scenario includes a pregnant woman whose rights were violated because the doctor didn’t “do VBACs” . . . she narrowly escaped a coerced C-section.

I’m glad to read such an intelligent post about the politics of birth in America, and I perused the Hot Belly Mama blog a bit more and came across a great opportunity to win a Bumgenius diaper:

Win a free Bumgenius 3.0 Diaper! This is a valuable All-In-One cloth diaper that you can use for yourself or give as a gift to someone expecting a baby! Go check out Hot Belly Mama’s Blog for details on how to win this wonderful All In One Cloth Diaper. Hot Belly Mama will announce the winner on March 30th, after her 30th birthday!

Here is the direct link to her blog:

http://hotbellymama.blogspot.com/

Good luck

So go ahead and enter to win a diaper, read Hot Belly Mama’s great perspective on life, and perhaps add her to your blogroll.

Another great blog I follow is called Stand and Deliver.  Rixa writes about birth, and she knows quite a lot.  Her blog is a fount of knowledge about birth and the birthing scene here.  In fact, she has her PhD and her dissertation is about the unassisted homebirth movement in North America.  It’s a great read, and I highly recommend letting that PDF load and sitting down with a drink and a snack to take it all in.

I was also delighted to find that she received her PhD in my state of Iowa, specifically at the University of Iowa which I’m considering for my own masters or doctorate.

Rixa’s latest post enlightened me of two breastfeeding books which I could enter to win, and I wanted to share those opportunities with you:

First, the Motherwear blog is giving away a copy of Breastfeeding: A Parent’s Guide by Amy Spangler.  Please click HERE to enter.

The second book you could win is a visual guide to breastfeeding entitled Breastfeeding with Comfort and Joy: A Photographic Guide for Mom and Those Who Help Her.  This innovative book is filled with large color photos of real women breastfeeding.  This kind of assistance is greatly needed in a culture in which women are innundated with images of bottlefed babies yet left in the dark about breastfeeding.

One of the more helpful tips included in the book is how to avoid sore nipples by facing the baby’s entire body inward towards yourself, instead of upward as they would if they were bottle feeding.  Because of the cultural images we absorb, women tend to face their breastfeeding babies up toward the ceiling and lean their breast over the baby’s face.  This causes a lot of pulling on the nipple and bad posture for the mom, both problems which can impair a breastfeeding relationship.  There’s more information in Rixa’s review of the book.

Having photos of other women nursing with their babies laying across laps with their bellies tucked close to their mothers’ bellies could help countless women (especially visual learners) get the hang of breastfeeding.

So, you want to win this awesome book?  Click HERE to enter.

Nursing your baby is something that can be hard to get right, especially if you don’t have the proper support.  Switching to formula is always an option, but it’s an overrepresented option.  Why would I say this?  Because Breastfeeding Saves Lives:

“Breastfeeding appears to significantly reduce the chances that babies will die in their first year of life, researchers reported recently.  An analysis of a nationally representative sample of about 9,000 US babies found breastfeeding decreased the risk of dying from any cause by about 20%.

The researchers estimated that about 720 infant deaths would be prevented annually if all Americans breastfed their babies for the first year [...] “There’s already a lot of reasons for women to breastfeed their babies,” said Walter Rogan, an epidemiologiest at the National Insitute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, “This is one more.”

Although other studies have found breastfeeding provided a variety of benefits for babies, including apparently reducing the risk of sudden infant death syndrome, the new study is the first to demonstrate an overall reduction in mortality.”

- The Calgary Herald

I’ve spent a lot more of my recent time reading blogs rather than blogging here, but I’m hoping to change that.  Coming soon will be my OWN giveaway.  Stay tuned!