Start here. Grow far.

Should H1N1 worries force hospitals to restrict child visitors?

My niece is about to give birth to her third child in about a month. She was informed, recently, by the small-town hospital where she'll deliver that her two older children (9 years and 1 year) will be unable to visit her. 

It appears that her hospital isn't the only one taking precautions as part of the efforts to stem the spread of swine flu to pregnant patients, those in labor and delivery and premature and newborn infants. 

Understandably, my niece is upset. She doesn't want to have to wait days to see her boys and introduce them to their new baby sister. But she understands the potential risks involved and also doesn't want anyone put at risk. Only she and her husband and their parents will be able to visit her and her new baby in the hospital. The rest of our family will have to wait a day or two or three to meet our newest addition.

I suppose that's a small price to pay to help keep those most at risk of swine flu (H1N1) away from potential exposure. But will it really accomplish much? I suppose we'll have to wait out this winter to see how it all unfolds.

Are you nearing your due date? What is your hospital's policy regarding child visitors? How would you feel if your own kids couldn't visit you and your newborn in the hospital?

[photo credit: SXC]

Let's chat about Sarah Palin

Keeping politics aside--because this is a blog about babies and parents and, well, there are other great blogs that discuss those topics along with politics--what do you think about Sarah Palin as John McCain's pick for his VP running mate and the fact that she's a mother to five children?

My first thought was, "Whoa! She's got five kids? One's an infant? And she's running for VP? I have two kids and I work from home part-time. Most days I can barely manage it all. How does she do it?" And then I thought, "She must be an uber-manager since she's got to handle not only the State of Alaska but her large family too. And, hmmmm, I wonder which is more difficult?" But, of course, I--and we as a nation--never question how men do it all no matter how many children they have. Why do we still, in this day and age, tend to treat women differently?

I may or may not agree with Palin's politics but I think her introduction to the national scene has already sparked intelligent and thoughtful debates and discussions about important women's issues. It's about time.

What do you think? Can a woman run a country and a family, both successfully, at the same time? Is her husband, by the very demanding nature of her potential job, relegated to the role of Mr. Mom and would that be a bad thing?

[photo credit: The Progressive]

And the winner is...CIO

After really thinking about it, reading your insightful, helpful and non-judgmental (thank you!) comments and taking the advice of my best friend (if you can't count on your best friend for parenting tips who can you count on???) I decided to go the CIO route this past weekend. As you can read here, it wasn't easy. But as you can also read here and here we had much success! I know that CIO isn't popular with everyone and it doesn't work for every child but boy, howdy, did it work for us. On Saturday night, our second CIO night, Waylon cried for a mere 45 seconds after I put him in his crib and he then slept for 11 hours straight! Now I'm left wondering why we didn't give CIO a chance months ago when everyone in our household was seriously sleep-deprived. I'll tell ya why: we were scared! I didn't want to see my baby boy cry or suffer needlessly. But he's doing great so far and for us, CIO was the way to go.

[photo credit: SXC]

Cry it out or suck it up?

My daughter started sleeping through the night at six weeks of age (sorry, Beth!). And, although I'd like to take credit, this magical, mythical occurrence was not due to anything my husband nor I did. Now enter our son. He's nearly eight months old and cannot be counted on to sleep through the night. Sure, he'll have a day or two or even three (when the heavens align and all is right with the world) where he sleeps great and doesn't wake once before morning. But he'll also have a spell or two or ten where he only sleeps for a few hours at a time. Getting up five times in five hours to rock him back to sleep is not exactly working for us any more. I know it's time for a change. I know his sleep problems are probably due, at least in part, to our coddling him and rocking him back to sleep every single time he wakes. It's probably time for a little CIO (cry it out) but I keep postponing our date with Ferber because I loathe the idea of letting our sweet boy scream, even for a few minutes, until he falls asleep. Seeing as how we created this situation, maybe we just need to suck it up and continue to rock him back to sleep whenever he wakes. But the thought that he could one day (soon?) fall asleep on his own is nearly intoxicating enough for me to give the Ferber method a try.

Have you had luck with CIO? Or are you so against it that you cringe at the mere mention? This inquiring (sleepless) mom wants to know.

[photo credit: SXC]