Parenting Tips

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Natural Fertility

There’s plenty of solid scientific evidence that suggests that your fertility is strongly influenced by your lifestyle (what you eat, what you do, your environment and how you live). Enhancing your natural fertility levels is often the first steps recommended by fertility experts – usually through diet and lifestyle changes. Focusing on your natural fertility doesn’t have to be a stand-alone tactic – it can be done before (or simultaneously with) any medical interventions.

Top tips to help you feel better every day

1. Spend at least one hour a day outdoors

Being indoors all day lowers serotonin levels. It is important to get out and about. Stop to smell the roses and enjoy a sunset regularly, it greatly improves your quality of life! Breathe deeply and breathe fresh air. Even 5 minutes can make a difference.

2. Keep your diet balanced

Good nutrition starts with eating a balanced diet and as many kinds of foods daily as you can. When you eat, slow down, enjoy your food and chew it well. Naturopaths suggest choosing a wide variety of fresh fruits and vegetables and to not overcook them. Also try to eat fish at least twice a week especially salmon or tuna. Good nutrition also means less saturated fat – limit sauces, gravies and margarine and remove or trim excess fat from animal products. Reduce caffeine and alcohol, but increase the amount of water you drink. Aim to have at least 2 litres daily and try to use a water filter.

Can fertility be increased? If so, what can you do to increase your fertility?

When you look at the factors that need to be in place to ensure a successful pregnancy, it’s a wonder that humans are able to reproduce at all! Both male and female fertility rely on a delicate balance of hormones which can be influenced by environmental factors ranging from the food you eat to toxins in the environment, stress and other emotional factors, illness, physical activity – even the outdoor temperature.

One of the key things that women can do to increase fertility is to be aware of your usual cycle and how external factors can influence this.

For men, an understanding of their own fertility cycle and the steps to better sperm health is also a critical component of increasing fertility.

If you’re trying to get pregnant, getting as much information about your own ovulation cycle and identifying those critical fertile days can really help you pinpoint the most likely days for you to get pregnant. For many women, using a fertility monitor can make the process much more straightforward.

The best time to have intercourse is in the 12 to 48 hours before ovulation occurs. This way, sperm have time to travel to the fallopian tubes to meet the egg when it is released from the ovary. Unlike many techniques such as monitoring the post-ovulation rise in body temperature, using a fertility monitor can identify the critical two days in the lead-up to ovulation, maximising your chance of getting pregnant.

Causes of Miscarriage

It is thought that around 50% of all miscarriages are due to a chromosomal problem occurring within the embryo. In women who are older than 35 years of age and those who have older partners, the incidence of this happening is increased. The other 50% of causes is not always clear. If a mother has a pre-existing medical condition then the cause of miscarriage can sometimes be attributed her diagnosis. The more common causes for concern and increased risk are lupus, diabetes or other endocrine disorders, infection, hormonal problems, or abnormalities with the uterus. Occasionally a blighted ovum is diagnosed where, in the very early days of conception, the embryo does not divide and multiply normally.

Middle age starts at 55 and extends to nearly 70 years old, survey suggests.

Middle age now begins at 55, new research suggests. A survey of 1000 men and women over-50, found that the average Briton thinks that they are youthful until the age of 55 and old age does not set in until around 70, suggesting that middle age is the 14 years in between.

Dummies already split opinion among parents

Using dummies prevents babies from mimicking facial expressions, psychologists say.

They are recommended to reduce the risk of infant cot death – but now parents have yet another dilemma to deal with as scientists claim “dummies may stunt baby boys’ emotional development”. According to new research by American psychologists, heavy use of pacifiers in infancy can be linked to poor emotional maturity later. The study, published today, suggests that dummies prevent babies from mimicking the expressions of the people around them – a vital learning tool.

Prevent Miscarriage

By definition, miscarriage is the loss of a pregnancy before 20 weeks gestation, though 98% of miscarriages will occur in the first 13 weeks. Sometimes, miscarriage occurs even before a woman realises she is pregnant.

In Australia each year, it is estimated that around 55,000 women will experience a miscarriage. Statistically, this equates to around one in every four pregnancies not resulting in a live baby. Although miscarriage is a relatively common event, it is still not well understood. Preventing it from occurring is not only difficult, but in many cases is almost impossible. Many researchers believe that miscarriage is nature’s way of stopping an imperfect embryo from maturing. Miscarriage often results in cases where a congenital condition would be incompatible with life, there is embryonic deformity, a chromosomal defect or there has been an interruption to normal cell division.

Having a tough week at work? Make sure you de-stress -- a new review of studies highlights how work stress could be hurting your health.

The review, published in the Journal The Lancet and conducted by researchers at the University College London, shows that people with demanding, straining jobs have an overall 23 percent increased risk of heart attack.

Getting pregnant after miscarriage

Some couples try almost immediately to get pregnant after Others feel that this is way too soon and they need more time to recover their emotional and sexual mojo. Needing lots of recovery time is especially true if you miscarried in the second trimester.

Deciding when to start is entirely up to you and your partner and what feels best. There is no right or wrong way to go. Don’t let others pressure you into trying to have a baby after miscarriage if you aren’t ready. Everyone from your doctor to your mother-in-law will have an opinion, but the only opinion that counts is yours. And that can change from yearning to start right away to never wanting to get pregnant ever again, all within the space of a few minutes!

How your sex life will change as a dad-to-be

For some men, sex during pregnancy is an incredible turn-on, but for others, well, it's not even on their radar. Both are perfectly natural responses. Where you stand on the issue depends on a lot of factors, but one thing is pretty much guaranteed: when your partner is pregnant your sex life will change.

Dads: how to share in your partner's pregnancy

Pregnancy is seen as mostly a woman's thing. Few women believe that their partner really understands what's involved. And the fact is, many of us dads-to-be don't. We talk about it. We show interest. We empathise (without going overboard). We even try to read about it, at least a little. But let's face it, our experience of having a baby is fairly removed from the real thing until we're face to face with nappy changing and sleep derivation. No dad can possibly relate to the minute-by-minute, close-to-the-heart, kick-in-the-gut reality of carrying a baby to term.

But we can participate. We can be there to listen to the first heartbeat, we can cut back on the beer or wine, we can pore over the naming books together, and more. Here are 10 ways you can be there, too.

Dads: 10 ways to be the perfect birth partner

Although it's hard to watch a loved one endure pain, most dads find the birth of their baby to be one of life's greatest moments. Of course, it's even better if you know that you've been there to help.

So what are the best ways to support your partner through what's likely to be the experience of a lifetime? Here are 10 tips from dads who have been there before to help you be the perfect birth partner.

Nearly half of women struggling to conceive get pregnant without treatment.

If the man is producing enough sperm, and the woman ovulating regularly, a couple who is struggling to conceive stands a good chance of falling pregnant without treatment. This has been shown by a study which found that many women aged up to 36 years with a history of infertility can achieve spontaneous conception and live birth without using fertility treatment, indicating (they) are sub-fertile rather than infertile.  Almost half of women who said they'd been struggling to get pregnant for at least a year ended up having a baby despite not getting fertility treatment, in a new study from Australia.  

Being an honest parent makes it easier to raise honest children.

In this big bad world we so often hear stories in the news about terrible things happening to children. As parents, we all hope it will never happen to us but are we doing enough to ensure that our children are kept safe?

Mother-to-daughter womb transplant 'success' in Sweden

Two Swedish women could be able to give birth using the wombs in which they were carried, doctors say, hailing the world's first mother-to-daughter uterus transplants.

The weekend procedures were completed by more than 10 surgeons at Sweden's University of Gothenburg. The names of the patients have not been revealed. Doctors caution they will not consider the operations successful unless the women achieve pregnancy. "We are not going to call it a complete success until this results in children," said Michael Olausson, one of the Swedish surgeons told The Associated Press. "That's the best proof."

The Lasting Effects of Neglect: Altered Brain Structure in Children

Fortunately, good foster care can help neglected children catch up developmentally, in part.

Kids who are neglected, growing up without normal emotional and social interaction, have measurably different brain structure from other kids, according to a new study from researchers at Boston Children’s Hospital.

The study compares kids raised in Romania’s infamous state-run orphanages with kids raised in normal Romanian family homes at the same time. MRI brain scans show that children raised in run-down institutions — typically with just one adult supervisor per 12 young kids — developed measurably lower grey matter volume and white matter volume in the cortex of the brain than children who grew up among their families.

Mindfulness, the practice of being present and in the moment, is easier for some people than for others. But it is a skill that many believe is worth cultivating—some say, starting with children. Preventing your mind from taking you into the past or future can, after all, be an antidote to depression (which can result from ruminating over previous mistakes, say) and anxiety (about bad things that might happen). Practicing attending to the sights, sounds and other sensations of the moment can, research shows, be calming. It can also train your focus. Both of these effects, it turns out, can have a fundamental impact on brain function.

There is a growing body of evidence that a lack of sleep enhances hunger signals in the brain © Rex

Getting a good night's sleep is just as important as diet and exercise when trying to lose weight, Canadian scientists have claimed.

A variety of studies suggest that getting at least seven hours' sleep every night can significantly improve the chance of losing weight while on a diet.  There is a growing body of evidence that a lack of sleep enhances hunger signals in the brain and increases levels of hormones which affect our appetite, causing us to eat more. Writing in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, researchers said sleeping habits ought to be addressed along with diet and physical exercise in programmes designed to help obese people lose weight.

You might be surprised to learn what kinds of TV shows are too scary for kids

If your kid is having trouble sleeping, take a closer look at what he’s been watching on TV. A new study published in the journal Pediatrics finds that violent or age-inappropriate programming could increase the odds that children have problems falling asleep and staying asleep or have nightmares.

As any parent knows, an exhausted child is an ill-behaved one. So it’s no surprise that a new study finds that young children who snore persistently — which can disrupt the quality of their sleep — are more likely to have behavioral problems like hyperactivity, depression and inattention than kids who don’t snore. “A lot of kids snore every so often, and cartoons make snoring look cute or funny. But loud snoring that lasts for months is not normal,” said lead author and neuropsychologist Dean Beebe of the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center in a statement, “and anything that puts young kids at that much risk for behavioral problems is neither cute nor funny.”

Staying up late cramming? Your grades might suffer for it

Teens who stay up late at night cramming are more likely to have academic problems the following day — doing poorly on the test they studied for — finds a new study by University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), researchers.

Since students increasingly give up sleep for studying as they get older, the researchers say the problem compounds over time. The study involved 535 students from Los Angeles high schools. For 14 days during each of three school years — 9th, 10th and 12th grades — the participants kept diaries tracking the amount of time they spent studying, how much they slept at night and whether or not they experienced academic problems the next day, such as not understanding something taught in class or doing poorly on a test, quiz or homework.

Here are helpful tips if you're thinking about rewarding good grades with greenbacks

s the school year begins, family conversations may turn to how friends spent their summer break, the back-to-school fashions that are hot this year and — oh yes, grades. While talk about vacations and blue jeans won’t generally cause conflict between family members, grades can be a tough topic — especially if a child’s performance in school doesn’t meet his or her parents’ expectations.

Eating too much sodium can contribute to high blood pressure in adults. Is a salty diet as dangerous for kids?

In a study published in the journal Pediatrics, researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say that young children are consuming as much salt as adults, putting them at a similarly increased risk of developing hypertension, a risk factor for heart disease and early death. The high blood pressure risk may greatest among the 37% of American kids who are considered either overweight or obese, the study found.

Cultura / Axel Bernstorff / Getty Images

Teens aren't using digital sexual behavior as a safer alternative to real-world sex, a study finds

Teens who send and receive sexually explicit texts or photos, colloquially known as “sexting,” are likely engaging in the same kinds of risky sexual behaviors offline, finds a new survey of Los Angeles high school students.

The recent survey of about 1,800 mostly Hispanic L.A. students, ages 12 to 18, found that teens who said they had sexted were seven times more likely to be sexually active than their peers who had never sent a naughty text. About three-quarters of surveyed teens had cell phones they used regularly; 15% had sexted and 54% said they knew someone who had. Kids who said their friends were sexting were 17 times more likely to sext themselves.

Early Music Lessons Have Longtime Benefits

When children learn to play a musical instrument, they strengthen a range of auditory skills. Recent studies suggest that these benefits extend all through life, at least for those who continue to be engaged with music.

But a study published last month is the first to show that music lessons in childhood may lead to changes in the brain that persist years after the lessons stop.

Fish Oil Supplements in Pregnancy Boost Infants' Immunity

A new study adds to the growing evidence that fish oil supplements in the diet of pregnant women can bolster their infants' immune systems.

In this case, babies overcame their colds faster if during pregnancy their mothers had taken 400 milligrams of a supplements containing docosahexaenoic acid (DHA). "DHA is important to the unborn and newborn child, and pregnant women should make sure that they get enough of it, preferably from fish, but otherwise from supplements," said Philip Calder, a professor of nutritional epidemiology at the University of Southampton in England, who was not involved with the research. The study is published online today (Aug. 1) in the journal Pediatrics.

Some prenatal gender tests that use mom's blood are very accurate at determining baby's sex, a new study finds. But curious parents-to-be should be wary of online marketers that claim to be able to figure out fetal gender using just a woman's urine.  New research to be published Aug. 10 in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds that after seven weeks into a pregnancy, tests that analyze mom's blood for fetal DNA can correctly identify a male fetus 95.4 percent of the time and a female fetus 98.6 percent of the time on average. In comparison, tests that analyzed DNA from urine instead of blood were only accurate 41 percent of the time, said study researcher Diana Bianchi, a reproductive geneticist at Tufts University School of Medicine.  "It was worse than flipping a coin," Bianchi told LiveScience.  

Babies born to women who took folic acid supplements before and during pregnancy are at a lower risk for difficulties in developing their language skills, a new study says.

Taking folic acid for a period starting four weeks before conception through eight weeks after conception more than halved a child's risk of developing a severe language delay at age 3. Three year olds who spoke in one-word utterances, or who were intelligible, were considered to have a severe language delay, the study said.

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Spanking or slapping your child has long-term, harmful effects on their development, according to a new review of 20 years of research.

Over the past two decades, research has increasingly found links between such "everyday" types of physical punishment and higher levels of child aggression, according to the review. In fact, no studies have found this type of child discipline to predict a positive long-term effect. "I think it's important for parents to understand that although physical punishment might get a child to do something in the immediate situation, there are many side effects that can develop over the long term," said co-author Joan Durrant, a child clinical psychologist at Family Social Sciences at the University of Manitoba in Canada.

Exercise is generally great for health, but extreme forms of it may be bad for the heart in some cases, experts say.

Recent evidence suggests training for and participating in extreme endurance exercises, such as marathons and triathlons, may cause heart problems in some, researchers say. There's very little to gain from doing more than about an hour of exercise a day, said Dr. James O'Keefe, at cardiologist at Saint Luke's Hospital in Kansas City, Mo.

Exercise not only improves mood, it may help people maintain reduced anxiety in the face of stressful or emotional events, a new study says.

While many studies have shown a link between exercise and better mood, it was not known "whether these positive effects endure when we're faced with everyday stressors once we leave the gym," said study researcher J. Carson Smith, assistant professor in the Department of Kinesiology at the University of Maryland School of Public Health.

Moms Gain Health Benefits From Breast-Feeding, Too

Breast-feeding not only delivers health benefits to babies, it also improves mothers' health.

The American Academy of Pediatrics reaffirmed its policy on breast-feeding, and in its statement, along with explaining the well-known benefits for babies of being breast-fed, the pediatricians' group also detailed the evidence for health benefits of breast-feeding for women. "Both short- and long-term health benefits accrue to mothers who breast-feed," the policy statement said.

Breast-feeding may contribute to the development of healthy bacteria in a baby's gut, a new study finds.

The results show that three-month-old babies that had been fed only breast milk had a wider range of bacteria in their guts than babies that were fed only formula. The researchers also found a link between the bacteria in the babies' guts and changes in the expression of genes involved in their immune systems.

A baby sits on a couch, drinking from a bottle.

Harmless-looking bottles, pacifiers and sippy cups are associated with a significant number of injuries in infants and toddlers, a new study finds.

Researchers looked at a database of hospital records, and found 45,000 cases of children under age 3 being treated in emergency rooms for injuries related to using these products between 1991 and 2010.

While the media is often blamed for influencing young girls' desire to be sexy, a new study suggests mothers' attitudes play a more important role.

In the study, researchers found no link between the amount of TV and movies that girls ages 6 to 9 watched, and their risk of sexualizing themselves. (Sexualization is defined as valuing oneself solely on sex appeal, or treating oneself as a sex object.) However, among girls who watched a lot of TV and movies, those who had mothers who worried about their own looks were at increased risk of early sexualization, the study found.

For the tiniest babies, adding baby formula to their diet of breast milk may help them grow faster, a new study says.

Researchers followed 171 infants who generally weighed about 2 pounds at birth. These "very low birth weight" (VLBW) infants had been born during the 27th week of pregnancy on average (10 weeks before full term), and their weights were normal for babies born that early.

Kids with no siblings may be at increased risk for childhood obesity, a new study from Europe suggests.

In the study, children between ages 2 to 9 with no siblings were about 50 percent more likely to be overweight than children who had siblings. The results held even after the researchers took into account factors that could influence the children's weight, including gender, birth weight, parental weights, and the amounts of time the kids spent playing and watching TV.

The health benefits of circumcision outweigh the procedure's risks, and the operation should be covered by insurance, according to new recommendations from an influential group of doctors.

The recommendations, released today (Aug. 27) by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), say the procedure's benefits include reducing the risks of HIV infection, urinary tract infection and penile cancer. But the AAP also says the benefits of circumcision are not weighty enough to broadly recommend circumcision for all male infants.

People who are normal weight but carry extra fat around their belly have a higher risk of dying from heart disease than obese people, a new study suggests.

The findings add to a growing body of research that so-called visceral fat, or fat around the organs of the abdomen, is particularly bad for health. “Our research shows that if a person has a normal BMI, this by itself should not reassure them that their risk for heart disease is low. Where their fat is distributed on their body can mean a lot," said study researcher Dr. Francisco Lopez-Jimenez, a cardiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

People who are physically fit during middle age have not only a higher chance of living longer, but also are less likely to suffer from chronic diseases later in life, compared with their less fit counterparts, a new study says.

Women who eat peanuts during pregnancy may reduce their child's risk of asthma later in life, a new study from Denmark suggests.

In the study, children of mothers who ate peanuts at least once a week during pregnancy were 21 percent less likely to develop asthma by the time they were 18 months old, compared with children of mothers who did not eat peanuts while pregnant. The study found a similar link between eating tree nuts, such as almonds and pecans, during pregnancy and a lower risk of asthma in children.

People who have a very rare form of autism may benefit from treatment with a common nutritional supplement, a new study suggests. The results show some people who have symptoms of both autism and epilepsy have a rare genetic mutation that causes them to have abnormally low levels of essential nutrients called branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs).

When the researchers fed a diet enriched with BCAAs to mice that were engineered to have that same genetic mutation, the diet completely reversed the symptoms, the researchers said. The mice not fed the enriched diet showed the symptoms of epilepsy and other neurological problems.

Smoking marijuana may increase young men's risk of testicular cancer, a new study suggests.

In the study, marijuana users were about twice as likely to be diagnosed with testicular cancer compared to those who had never used marijuana. The link was particularly strong for the types of testicular cancer that tend to have a worse prognosis, the researchers said. The study only found an association, and does not show marijuana use causes testicular cancer. However, the work is the third study to find such a link, and the results warrant investigation into whether compounds in marijuana smoke may be carcinogenic to the testes, the researchers said.

Many people who see a doctor for a sore throat receive prescriptions for antibiotics, but most do not need them, experts say.

That's because most sore throats are caused by viruses, which do not respond to antibiotics, the Infectious Diseases Society of America says.

According to new guidelines released today (Sept. 11) by the IDSA, people should take antibiotics for strep throat only if a test confirms they have the condition.

As a parent, I've had my share of "meal battles" with kids. Even if you vow never to take your children to any fast food joints, they will still see the commercials on television, or hear about the food from their friends. Unfortunately, there's no skirting this issue. But one study set out to see whether it's the food, or the toys in kids' meals that are attracting the kiddos.

Some kids gain weight after having surgery to remove their tonsils, and the risk is greatest for those less than 6 years old, a new study finds.

In the study, which analyzed information from 115 children ages 6 months to 18 years, the average weight gain six months after a tonsillectomy was two to five pounds.

You're probably familiar with the tried-and-true ways of lowering your risk of heart disease and stroke: quit smoking, lose weight, exercise and lower your blood pressure and cholesterol. But recent studies have uncovered some possible preventative measures that are not so commonplace. Here are five surprising ways to keep your heart and blood vessels healthy.

Boys whose parents divorce may be at increased risk of stroke later in life, a new study suggests.

In the study, men whose parents had divorced parents before they were 18 were three times more likely to suffer a stroke during adulthood compared with those whose parents did not divorce. The results held even after the researchers took into account factors that influence the risk of stroke, including smoking habits, exercise, obesity, alcohol use and health care coverage. Participants were not included in the study if they had experienced child abuse, or their parents were addicted to drugs or alcohol.

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Getting enough deep sleep may play an important role in determining when puberty begins.

In a small new study, adolescents ages 10 to 15 were examined while they slept for increases in luteinizing hormone, which triggers ovulation in females and stimulates the production of testosterone in males. Previous research showed that luteinizing hormone levels increase dramatically before puberty, and that this increase occurs initially only at night. The new study found that most of the surges occurred during slow-wave sleep, or deep sleep, from which it is particularly hard to wake people up.

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