Travelling

Many parents worry that travelling might thwart healthy and established sleeping patterns. However, before you swear off travelling, or panic about an upcoming trip, here are some pointers that can help.

• Plan the length of your trip. Be honest about what you and your toddler can handle. While older children might be able to deal with 10 or more hours in the car, younger toddlers and babies can’t. Generally speaking, young children should not be subjected to confinement in a car for more than six hours a day. This is just as much for your sanity as it is for theirs.
• Children are prone to suffer from a bout of car or motion sickness so be prepared for this. Consult your doctor or pharmacist ahead of time for medication.
• To avoid frustration, confusion and last minute run-around on departure day, start packing a few days before you leave. Ensure that you pack their favorite sleeping toy and blanket.
• Get your car packed and ready the night before if you are planning to leave early in the morning. This includes getting snacks, drinks, a spare set of clothing, first aid kit and other essentials prepared. Toys, books and other key things to keep your child occupied should be stored in the car where it is easy for them to reach while not causing any safety concerns. Make sure the DVD player or iPad is charged and the screen set up where it won’t distract the driver.

Jetlag

Well-rested children cope with jetlag and time differences much better than if they are deprived of sleep. If your baby has had a good sleep schedule prior to leaving, she should be able to fit into a new time zone easily.

• If your baby is showing signs of needing an extra nap to catch up on rest, try limit it to 45 minutes. And, if the nap is close to bedtime, rather move bedtime up and skip the nap.
• To adjust your toddler to a new time zone, try spend time outdoors as the light is a good time cue  which will encourage their little bodies to adjust easier.
• Keep light to a minimum before bedtime – this will help stimulate melatonin production and encourage sleep.

Sleeping

• Do not over-schedule or over-plan. Even though you’re on holiday, too much stimulation and back-to-back activities aren’t advised as these cut into rest (and put more pressure on the parents too).
• Even though you’re on holiday, try not to bend the rules too much, even though babies and toddlers frequently test the sleep boundaries in a new environment. The best thing to do if there are wakings or crying, is to treat it the same way you would at home. You can go in every five minutes or so to offer some comfort. If you remain consistent, your child will adapt much easier to the new environment, and is likely to sleep well.
• Make sure you bring your child’s sleeping toy and blanket, and be aware that if bed sharing happens on holiday and not at home, your child is likely to demand the same setup at home. Most hotels have cots – inquire before you go, and if not, take a camp cot with you.
• If your child is older than eight months, try to set their cot or bed up in a private space for them to sleep in.

About the Author: Good Night is a child and baby sleep consultancy that specialises in helping parents with children who struggle to sleep soundly. For more information, visit: www.goodnightbaby.co.za

The post Tips for travelling with your baby or toddler appeared first on All4Baby.

Pregnant women in their third trimester may want to make an effort to hit the sack earlier after a new study found that poor-quality sleep in the last stretch of pregnancy might lead to adult obesity in their offspring.

Sleep patterns follow health of offspring

That’s the conclusion of research from the University of Chicago, where scientists interrupted sleep patterns in pregnant mice and followed the health of their offspring.

During the third trimester of their pregnancy, scientists sent a motorized brush through their cages, forcing the animals to wake up briefly, step over the brush and try to resume their sleep.

Another batch of pregnant mice were allowed to sleep uninterrupted in another cage.

Though newborns from both groups weighed roughly the same, researchers noted that their weight and health outcomes differed significantly as they grew into adults.

Male mice born to sleep-disturbed mothers weighed 10 percent more than their counterparts — the equivalent of 15 extra lbs (7 kg) in a human adult.

A few of the animals became morbidly obese and died earlier as well. Researchers focused on male mice because their hormone levels are less complex and easier to track. 

Overall, babies born after fragmented sleep also scored poorly on glucose tolerance tests and developed disproportionately high amounts of visceral white fat or “bad fat,” as well as elevated levels of “bad cholesterol.”

The findings were published recently in the journal Diabetes.

Use these tips to prepare for a good nights sleep

The results of the study may come as poor comfort to women in their third trimester who have to deal with protruding bellies and kicking babies.

But the National Sleep Foundation in the US offers a few tips on how to prepare for a good night’s sleep. Here’s a selection:

1. Sleep on your left side to allow for the best blood flow to the fetus and to your uterus and kidneys. Avoid lying flat on your back for a long period of time.
2. Drink fluids during the day, but cut down before bedtime.
3. Exercise regularly to help you stay healthy, improve your circulation, and reduce leg cramps.
4. Try frequent bland snacks (like crackers) throughout the day. This helps avoid nausea by keeping your stomach full.
5. Special “pregnancy” pillows and mattresses may help you sleep better. Or use regular pillows to support your body.
6. Napping may help. An NSF poll found that 51 percent of pregnant or recently pregnant women reported at least one weekday nap.
7. Learn to relax with relaxation and breathing techniques, which can also help when the contractions begin. A warm bath or shower before bed can be helpful.

The post Pregnant? Here’s why you should hit the sack earlier! appeared first on All4Baby.

And seriously, I wouldn’t want to be a man. Not just because your bodies look uncomfortable to me (which they do), or because I would be missing out on some fabulous girls’ nights or because being tackled looks painful and masochistic. But mainly because I think being a woman is awesome. All PMS and feminine hygiene products aside, this is a good club to be in.

Except for right now.

Other than 12 blissful, semi-normal weeks squished right there in the middle for our sanity, being pregnant is kind of tough. I’m going to attempt to paint a picture for you, even though I know I don’t have the artistic skills to paint one well enough for you to ever be able to vicariously experience, empathise or understand these life-creating, uterus-expanding, back-breaking 40 weeks that we call pregnancy.

All I know is that we were chosen, exclusively, to carry, labour and deliver your children that you implant within us. There is no “your turn”.

Here are some things you might consider, though, the next time you stop feeling sorry for me or any other pregnant woman…

Let’s talk bladder control

It’s as if, every 15 minutes, this tiny mite atop my bladder gains 10 kgs and starts using it as a trampoline. Well, apparently, bladder trampolines have a weight limit. And running to the toilet is not a solution. In fact, running will only speed up the inevitable. You will wet your pants when you’re pregnant. You might even think your water broke, start crying, call your doctor, your mom and your husband thinking you’re going into preterm labour, only to be told you wet your pants.

You think you are hungry?

I realise that you think you are often hungry. No. You don’t know hunger. We are hungry. All the time. This hunger is the type of hunger that makes you feel like you are going to throw up if you don’t eat something right this second.

Ever had a Charlie Horse?

You know, when your toes start curling and your calf starts cramping like you just ran a marathon? We could eat five bananas a day and still wake up at two a.m. writhing in pain. It eventually passes. For about 24 hours.

One word: backache

Every time we sit down, lie down, bend down, look down, our entire back becomes one giant nerve bundle of anger. Standing up is impossible without assistance. But I have halfway mastered the roll to the side, prop up on one arm, push up to the knees, and find something sturdy to pull up on. I am a 78-year-old arthritic woman.

No, we’re not lazy

There are no words to describe the exhaustion. Your wife is not joking when she says she literally can’t keep her eyes open. This is the tired that extends beyond drowsy, way past fatigued, right into dead-man-walking territory.

Don’t ask why we cry

I’m sorry we cry all the time. We are embarrassed by our instability. Don’t ask us why we’re crying. We don’t know. Don’t say, “well, there must be some reason”, because then we will have to think really hard and we might come up with a reason that is, in fact, not the reason at all (because, seriously, there’s not one). This fake reason will sound ridiculous (because it is), turn into a huge fight and then we will just cry some more.

Gone is the body and the mind

We not only lose our bodies – we lose our minds. For example, I will walk into a room fully intending to grab something before we leave, stand there, look around, walk out of the room and walk back in trying to jog my memory, and then just leave. It’s only once we get wherever we’re going that I realise that I have no diapers or wet-wipes and that’s what I probably went back inside for

So, dads, we’re not asking that you carry the next one. We’re not asking that you rub our feet every night or bring us breakfast in bed (but we won’t turn it down). We’re not even asking that you feel sorry for us.

We just ask that you add a dollop of patience to your personality for a few months. We ask that you give us hugs when we’re being crazy, tell us we look beautiful when our faces are as round as our bums, and let us take a few naps on occasion. Because it’s not just our bellies that are changing, it’s our entire world. And we all know that we don’t have the emotional stability to handle that kind of thing on our own.

The post Dear dads-to-be, pregnancy is tough appeared first on All4Baby.