Child Development

There are some funny tips about pregnancy from Dominican Republic web-site!!!
• When a baby is just born you say “God Bless You” to prevent the child from getting the evil eye
• If you let a child see his or her reflection before they’re two years old they won’t talk.
• Put a small bracelet of beads on the child’s ankle or wrist to ward off evil and to bring prosperity.
• You must never say no if a pregnant woman asks you for something that you are eating, if you do you’ll get a sty. To be on the safe side ALWAYS ask pregnant women if they would like something of what you’re eating.
• Be aware of witches who try and eat babies ( from the legend)! That is really important!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• When very young children are given a nickname. No one will use their real name so as to deter attacks from evil spirits. This custom is very common it is said that a witch needs to know your real name in order to curse you. So in this way with the fake name it conceals their true identities from anyone trying to curse them.
• If you drop a spoon and the bowl of the spoon is up (it looks like a pregnant women) a new family member will be arriving soon.
• Some parents in Dominican Republic hang a baseball glove on the crib of a newborn baby boy as a good luck charm because they wish him to become a great baseball player.
• When a child bends over and looks at you from between their legs, it is said that they want another little brother or sister.
• A pregnant woman should not walk underneath a guanabana tree as she may lose her child.
• If a baby is getting sick or congested take a hair off a menstruating woman’s head and tie it around the babies wrist for 24 hours and the child will not get sick.
• When a baby has hiccups, put a hair from the mother’s head on the baby’s head until the hiccups go away.
Yeah, very important advices!!!!! I ‘m going to follow all of them!!!!

There are two important traditions in Eastern European culture.
The ceremony of the “first bath” is the first one. Only women can assist in the bathing of the newborn child, and the oldest woman related to the father of the baby is in charge of the event. Fresh, clean water enriched with flowers, money, honey and milk are thought to purify and join the newborn to the family. The elder woman gives the cleansed baby to the mother with wishes for the child’s moral, spiritual and physical integrity. She wishes for the child to marry, to be good-looking and healthy, to be respectful of his or her parents and to be a patient person. She wishes that the child thrives, grows to maturity, becomes hardworking and experiences good luck in life.
The second important moment related to birth is the Christening of the child, a ceremony in which the child is named. In the Eastern Orthodox church, the spiritual, or “God-parents” of the child have an important ceremonial function. Usually, the child will be named after the God-father, or after a close family member. Later, the God-parents will play an important role in the wedding ceremony of the child.
I like these traditions and think that they are very beautiful!

I love coffee! Sometimes even more then my life !!!!!!! And it is really difficult for me not to drink it. I can’t!!! So I’m trying to drink it less then before. About one cup a day.
I found the information that too much caffeine during pregnancy - over five cups of ordinary strength coffee a day - could increase the risk of having a low birth-weight baby. These babies are at greater risk from a range of problems in later life, including developmental delay in childhood and high blood pressure in adulthood, making this an important relationship to understand.
So one cup is not so bad and probably I should stop to worry that such amount of caffeine can influence my little baby.
But me should remember that caffeine is present in many products from chocolate to over-the-counter medications such as flu remedies. The following materials contain caffeine: Tea (one 5-oz cup) — 40 to 60 mg, Coffee (one 5-oz cup) — 105 to 115 mg, Cola (one 12-oz glass) — 30 to 40 mg, Chocolate (one ounce) — 5 to 10 mg, Cocoa (one 5-oz cup) — about 4 mg. I’m very surprised that many pain relievers have significant amounts of caffeine ranging from 30 mg or more per tablet. Many other over-the-counter diet pills, stimulants, and diuretics contain from 100 to 200 mg of caffeine per pill. The ingredients of cough medicines, cold medicines, and allergy pills may also contain 16 mg of caffeine per tablet or more.
I also learned that there is the correlation between the ability to get pregnant and the consumption of caffeine. The less consumed, the better the chances are of getting pregnant, since caffeine interferes with the hypothalamus function.
Be careful girls!!!

When my husband, my parents and especially my doctor found out that I am pregnant began to tell me that I have to be calm, I shouldn’t think about bad things and I shouldn’t have be stressed in any case. Because stress during pregnancy affects child. But how is this possible? Pregnancy is not a short period in our life. And during this time I have some problems at my work or my University I should solve. And sometimes nobody can help me and I should deal with all the troubles on my own. So I decided to look for some information about this and found a new study I agree with.
Researchers from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and the National Institute of Child Health Development (NICHD) asked 137 healthy, pregnant women with low-risk, normal pregnancies to report on their levels of anxiety and stress between the 24th and 32nd weeks of their pregnancy, as well as six weeks and two years after the birth. The researchers also assessed the women’s feelings about the pregnancy. Two years later, the researchers evaluated the mental and motor development of the children born to those women, as well as the toddlers’ ability to control their behavior and regulate their emotions.
The researchers found that the mothers’ emotions during pregnancy were indeed associated with child development – but not in the expected direction. Women who reported more stress and anxiety during pregnancy had children who were somewhat more advanced in their mental and motor development at age 2. This remained true even after taking into account the women’s stress and anxiety levels after birth, which can influence child rearing in other ways.
In addition, there were no effects of prenatal stress or anxiety on the children’s ability to handle their own emotions or control their behavior with one exception: children of women who reported more negative feelings about being pregnant had somewhat poorer behavioral and emotional regulation. It’s not known, however, if this is a specific biological effect or whether women who were highly negative about being pregnant treated their children differently after birth.
A developmental psychologist and professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health say that «While these findings may seem counterintuitive, chemicals that are produced by stress have a well-known influence on organ growth and development. Mild to moderate stress has been proposed to be important to successful adaptation to the environment after birth and necessary for optimal brain development.» She notes, however, that study participants were well-nourished, financially stable women who were not receiving psychiatric care. “These women experienced the typical types of stresses and anxieties that accompany juggling the many roles and responsibilities of modern life,” she said. “It is possible that the results might be different if the study had included women undergoing more chronic, physical, or severe turmoil.”
So we can “stop worrying about worrying”. I think it is great!!! And I am sure, that my child is not gonna be unadapted to this life, because she is already solving some problems with her mum!!!

I think that Asian cultures are very specific and incomprehensible for European and American people. For example, Chinese culture is very old and it has some very interesting customs.
Some of them are about pregnancy.
In Chinese culture, they function to protect the pregnant woman and child from ‘malign influences’ and to avert problems with pregnancy and birthing such as miscarriage, stillbirth, death of the mother and imperfections in the newborn.
Many customs relate to the behavior and environment of the pregnant Chinese woman. Working with glue or other adhesives may cause birthing complications and hammering nails is thought to cause deformity in the fetus. Restraint in day to day life is also required of the mother: the use of foul language must be avoided as this may cause the baby to be cursed. So may torturing, striking or killing an animal: anthropomorphic results may occur- e.g. if a rat is struck the newborn child will look like a rat and behave like one! (Actually I don’t understand it!)
Consequently, traditional Chinese society blames the mother of a child that is physically disabled or ‘deformed’ for the ‘imperfections’ of the child, as it is believed that this has resulted from the mother’s actions during pregnancy. In former times, infanticide often occurred in such circumstances, to spare the mother shame, public humiliation and ostracism by in-laws. Well I don’t think it’s right. Probably sometimes it is a mother’s fault if she smoked or drinked a lot during the pregnancy. But what about different genetic deviations and other reasons?
A pregnant woman is expected and encouraged to continue working, as it is believed that this will ease labour and delivery. Arguments and disputes are to be avoided as the baby may be disturbed by them. Nutritious foods and herbal soups should be eaten, and ‘sharp’ foods such as pineapple and some other fruits avoided as they may cause miscarriage. Eating squid and crab are discouraged: the former is believed to cause the uterus to ‘stick’ during delivery, the latter to result in a mischievous child. Overeating may cause an overlarge baby and thus a difficult labour and delivery. A pregnant woman should not walk around barefoot.
Rubbing the abdomen too often is thought to result in a spoilt and overdemanding child. No! I hope not! I’m doing it really often. I just want my baby know I love her so much!!!
Old traditions believe that the sex of a baby can be determined by the shape of the pregnant woman’s abdomen, especially after the first three months. If the appearance of the belly is pointed, then the child will be male, if rounded, female. Actually people from many countries think the same way. For example Russians.
It is considered insauspicous to give a name to an unborn baby, as this displays and eagerness on the part of the parents for a child of a particular sex, and may cause disappointment if the child is of the different sex. Probably it’s true. You never know exactly who is in there!
The major responsibility for care of the pregnant woman is taken by her mother-in-law, not her husband. I don’t understand why? Probably because long time ago woman usually lived in husband’s family after the marriage. But what about him?
The production of a male heir is of paramount importance in Chinese culture; indeed some Chinese may seek the help of a holy man or shaman if male offspring do not appear. Superstition has it that a couple should eat certain types of food for the seven days leading up to conception to conceive a certain sex baby: tofu, mushrooms, carrots and lettuce for a male child, pickles, meat and fish for a female.
Male descendents are essential to ensure the continuance of ancestor worship and the continuity of family lineage and name. Females cannot inherit, and in the Chinese family system wife lives with the husband’s family and is deemed as no longer part of her own family, but the property of the husband’s family. Female offspring are thus thought of as being only ‘temporary’ family members, while male offspring ‘belong’ to the family for their lives. Yeah, that’s why they all will have a big problem very soon. Chinese are allowed to have only one child by the government. And everybody wants a boy. So who is going to give a birth to children in twenty – thirty years?

One of my pregnancies problems is varicose veins and spiders. I had some spiders on my right leg before pregnancy, but it became much worse now. So I decided to find some information about this problem. Look what I found.
Many women first develop varicose veins or find that they get worse during pregnancy. Because during pregnancy there is a huge increase of amount of blood in the body. This can cause veins to enlarge. And your progesterone levels rise, causing the walls of your blood vessels to relax. Also as your uterus grows, it puts pressure on the large vein on the right side of your body, which in turn increases pressure in the leg veins. Veins are the blood vessels that return blood from the extremities to your heart, so the blood in leg veins is already working against gravity.
Doctors say that pregnant woman more likely to get varicose veins if other members of her family have had them. Actually I don’t have anybody in my family with such problem. If you have varicose veins, they tend to get worse with each successive pregnancy and as you get older. That is not good news! Being overweight, carrying twins or higher multiples, and standing for long periods can also make you more susceptible.

But the good news is that varicose veins usually improve within 3 months after delivery!

There are some steps to prevent varicose veins and spider veins from getting worse:
Rest frequently. The less you exert your body, the less pressure you will put on your veins.
Exercise to increase blood flow and circulation.
Sleep on your left side. Wedge a pillow behind your back to keep yourself tilted to the left. The largest vein in your body is the vena cava and carries the largest amount of blood through your body. Because it is located on the right side of your body, lying on your left side will decrease added pressure on the vein.
Elevate your feet often to increase blood flow. When your legs become fatigued and sore, sit with your feet propped up on a table or chair. Don’t cross your legs or ankles when sitting. Don’t sit or stand for long periods without taking breaks to move around
Do not stand or sit for long periods of time. If you must stand for a long time, shift your weight from one leg to the other every few minutes. If you must sit for long periods of time, stand up and move around or take a short walk every 30 minutes.
Eat a low-salt diet rich in high-fiber foods. Eating fiber reduces the chances of constipation which can contribute to varicose veins. High fiber foods include fresh fruits and vegetables and whole grains, like bran. Eating too much salt can cause you to retain water or swell.
And I understood that the best way to keep our legs beautiful is to wear special support hose. Prescription-strength hose, known as graduated-compression stockings, work best and are available from medical supply stores and pharmacies. These stockings are twice as thick as normal pantyhose. Tight at the ankle, they get looser as they go up the leg, making it easier for blood to flow back up toward your heart. As a result, they help prevent swelling and may keep your varicose veins from getting worse. Put them on before getting out of bed in the morning, while you’re still lying down, to prevent blood from pooling in your legs, and keep them on all day.
I got this special support hose for myself. I am wearing it the whole day. Yeah, it really helps. Now I don’t have any ache and heaviness in my legs, feeling of heat and tenderness over my veins. And there is one more good thing. I don’t see my legs during the day because this support hose is black and very thick. When I go to the bed and put it off my legs look not so bad. That calms me down!!! And it is very important for me. But, my God, how difficult to put it on in the morning! And the summer is coming! It is gonna be so hot to wear it! What I’m gonna do?
Besides, doctors say that I should wear support hose at least 6-8 weeks after giving a birth to my baby. My God! I’m not sure I can do this. Too hot!

After I stop to feed my baby I decided to make sclerotherapy. This is the most common treatment when the doctor injects a solution into the vein that causes the vein walls to swell, stick together, and seal shut. This stops the flow of blood and the vein turns into scar tissue. In a few weeks, the vein should fade. The same vein may need to be treated more than once.
This treatment is very effective if done the right way. Most patients can expect a 50% to 90% improvement. Microsclerotherapy uses special solutions and injection techniques that increase the success rate for removal of spider veins. Sclerotherapy does not require anesthesia, and can be done in the doctor’s office.
Possible side effects include: temporary stinging or painful cramps, temporary red raised patches of skin, temporary small skin sores, temporary bruises where the injection was made. I think I can handle it and have nice legs again!!!!

I am very happy that the medicine has reached a big progress at present time. Medicine can easily overcome now a lot of unsoluble before problems.
One of my friends got pregnant and recognizes by blood test that she is in a big trouble. She got a Rhesus factor problem.
Usually it happens if a husband has a positive Rhesus factor, and a wife has a negative one. In this case baby will receive in a half of all cases a positive Rhesus factor. This means that if mummy’s blood comes into contact with her baby’s, she’ll develop antibodies to it. Nature has already taken care of that and the blood of mum and a baby is not mixed. That is why there is no danger for your first positive Rhesus factor baby (in a case if you didn’t make an abortion before, didn’t have a miscarriage or termination).
But when woman is giving birth some of baby’s blood may get into her circulation.
If it does happen, the woman will produce antibodies to the Rhesus factor positive blood and they’ll stay in her blood and if she becomes pregnant again, problems can arise.
During the second pregnancy these antibodies will attack Rhesus factor positive baby’s blood, causing it to breaking down the red blood cells of the baby and anemia will develop. In severe cases this hemolytic disease can cause illness, brain damage and even death.
So mummy’s organism behaves like he is not her native child. He is an enemy who needs to be destroyed. It is even terrible to think about it!
However problems at repeated pregnancy can be avoided now. Women who are Rhesus factor negative are usually given an injection of a special substance right after the baby is born (or after a miscarriage or termination). This helps the Rhesus factor negative mother by suppressing her ability to react to the Rhesus factor positive red cells. Reactions to the medication are generally minor, including soreness at the injection sight and sometimes a slight fever.
Sometimes an injection is given to Rhesus factor negative women during pregnancy.
So it is not a problem anymore!!!!! And any Rhesus factor negative woman and Rhesus factor positive man can have as many children as they want!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There are a lot of different signs and superstitions about pregnancy in different countries. A lot of people believe in them, but I think that the majority of them are absolutely senseless. People made up them many years ago. They wanted to have healthy babies, but they didn’t have professional medicine help and modern equipment. Here are the most popular of them.
Pregnant woman shouldn’t cross her legs when sitting. Child will have curved legs.
Actually: Yes, it is better for pregnant women not to cross her legs when sitting. But it has nothing to do with curved babies legs. Blood circulation in legs can cause varicose and spider veins at such position of a body.
It is necessary to satisfy all pregnant woman desires in food. Even if this food is not very healthy.
It is considered, that each unsatisfied pregnant woman desire can complicate giving a birth. And the more there were such desires, the more struggles the woman will have during delivery. Actually: During the pregnancy it is really better to satisfy all your desires in food. But it does not influence the character of delivery. Organism of the pregnant woman knows better what is necessary for her right now. Yeah, some products are categorically forbidden by the doctors and it is probably better to follow their advices. But some gynecologists have come to conclusion long time ago, that if you REALLY want a “forbidden» product you can eat it in small quantities (for example, beer).
Pregnant woman can’t cut her hair.
It is considered, that each time cutting off the hair, future mum shortens her child’s life.
Actually: That is nonsense!!!!! On the contrary, during the pregnancy women usually have a problems with hair. Her hair structure gets worse. Hair become thinner, fragile, grows dull, split and fall out. Therefore, to improve hair and to have a good look, it is better to cut your hair regularly. And it is not gonna influence your child!!!
It is forbidden to buy any clothes and toys for the kid and to bring it into the house before delivery.
It is considered, that it is very bad sign.
Actually: It only a prejudice. What about baby showers?!!! I think it is better to buy everything you need for the baby. So right after returning from a maternity home you won’t have to run shopping. Or you’ll have to send your husband or relatives to buy all this stuff. And there is no sure in that they will buy the right things.

On June, 5th, 1989 Cadidja Abdella (Ethiopia) has given birth to a boy. A week has passed, the woman has almost recovered after the sorts as suddenly, on June 13th, she felt pangs and she … has given birth to a girl, which was 8 days younger than her brother.
Canadian twins Alice and Emma Roudz were born with a difference of 39 days. After premature birth which resulted in appearing of 500-gramm Alice, doctors managed to suspend patrimonial activity, and her younger sister was born 5 weeks later.
Berlin twins Krug have different years of birth in their metrics. Thus Anton Krug has outstripped his younger little sister Leila only for 15 minutes! It is explained very simply: Anton was born on December, 31st, 1997, shortly before midnight, and Leila has seen the light already on January, 1st, 1998.
Dates of birth of Aaron and Luc Hegenbergs from Massachusetts, born with a difference 8 minutes, are divided with a millennium: the senior was born on December, 31st, 2000, younger - on January, 1st 2001!

During the pregnancy I got a huge problem – anemia. And I want to tell about it.
Anemia happens when your blood doesn’t have enough hemoglobin. Hemoglobin helps red blood cells carry oxygen from your lungs to all parts of your body.
There are many types of anemia, but I got an iron deficiency anemia (IDA). Iron deficiency anemia happens when there is not enough iron in body. Probably I got IDA because my diet didn’t have enough iron in it. Pregnancy usually can cause iron deficiency anemia if there’s not enough iron for the mother and fetus. Sometimes this can happen when woman loses blood from problems like heavy periods, ulcers, colon polyps, or colon cancer.
The signs of anemia can be weakness, fatigue, low body, temperature, irritability, pale skin, rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, numbness or coldness chest pain, dizziness and headache.
Anemia is diagnosed by a blood test. The treatment for anemia depends on the cause of the anemia.
To prevent (treat) anemia I tried to eat food high in iron like red meat, fish, chicken liver or eggs, dried fruits, like apricots, prunes, and raisins lentils and green beans, leafy vegetables, like spinach and broccoli, or cereal with iron in it (iron-fortified).
You can also get iron from food like ground beef, clams, spinach, lentils, baked potato with skin, sunflower seeds, and cashews.
I can say that I ate all kind of these products, but it helped me just a little bit.
For more sources of iron, I tried to eat and drink food that helped my body absorb iron, like orange juice, strawberries, broccoli, or other fruits and vegetables with vitamin C. I tried not to drink coffee or tea with meals. It was really hard for me!!! These drinks make it harder for body to absorb iron. Calcium can hurt absorption of iron also.
I can say that if you have a hard time getting enough iron, make sure you get enough folic acid and vitamin B-12 in your diet!!!
Talk to your doctor about taking iron pills (supplements). But you should know that taking iron pills can cause side effects, like nausea, vomiting, constipation, and diarrhea. I got nausea. It was really unpleasant. And I even didn’t know that it was because of iron pills. I thought it was because hormones of pregnancy. But then I changed my pills for another kind and everything is fine now!!!
Only taking iron pills together with folic acid and water with lemon juice helped me. And of course fresh air!
Not getting enough iron can cause preterm labor and delivering a low-birth weight baby. So if you’re pregnant make sure you get 27mg of iron every day and take an iron supplement (pill). It may be part of prenatal vitamin, get tested for anemia.
For vegetarian woman.
It is easier to get iron from meat than from plant-derived foods. So some vegetarians may need to take a higher amount of iron each day than what is recommended for other people. Try to take vitamin C with other iron-rich foods.
Avoid iron overload
Iron overload happens when the body absorbs too much iron over many years. Excess iron builds up in organs, like the heart and liver. Many problems can cause iron overload. It can happen from years of taking too much iron or from repeated blood transfusions. But the most common form of iron overload is an inherited condition (runs in families) called hereditary.