The Mom Crowd

Healthy Child, Whole Child by Dr. Stuart Kitchek and Dr. Russell Greenfield is a book for parents who are interested in using both conventional and alternative medicine for prevention and treatment of illnesses.  The book is easy to read and the chapters are divided in such a way that if your child is dealing with a particular issue you can flip to the chapter and find out more information.

One think I appreciate about the book is that it takes a look at the WHOLE child, including environmental factors, activity levels, diet, and sleep.  It promotes that idea that preventing illness is a better strategy to healthy living rather and just treating every illness with the most aggressive strategy.  The doctors who wrote this book practice health care with the philosophy that integrating conventional (mainstream medicine), alternative (chinese medicine, aruvedic) and complementary medicine (acupuncture, herbal, or nutritional therapies) is the best approach to treating children and families.  They don’t dismiss alternative and complementary medicine and often prescribe remedies from those forms of treatment for illness.  In fact doctors who practice the philosophy of integrative medicine prefer to save the more aggressive treatments of illness if the more gentle approaches to medicine don’t work first.  They also prefer to have longer than 10 or  15 minutes with their patients.  In later chapters the book takes a deeper look at several types of alternative treatments (massage, chiropractic care, counseling, meditation/relaxation, herbal remedies, chinese medicine and homeopathics).  This is helpful especially if you are new to those types of treatment for sickness.

For those of you who are interested, the book encourages vaccination as one of the ways to keep your kids from getting sick.  Two chapters are dedicated to explaining how the immune system works, how vaccinations work and why they are important.  The book also explains why the overuse of antibiotics is a key factor in the “superbugs” that are now resistant to antibiotic treatment. One example is getting antibiotics for every ear infection.  A more integrative approach is to look at the evidence that most ear infections are viral and will resolve themselves in about 3 days.  The pain can be treated with over the counter pain relievers and perhaps a prescription pain reliever.  This approach can be stretching for parents who have it ingrained that an ear infection automatically means you need antibiotics to treat it.  The book has a whole chapter dedicated to explaining the different types of ear infections and how they are treated.

One surprising chapter is chapter 9 which is about how to protect your children from the hidden messages in mainstream culture–things like instant gratification, looks are everything, negativity, violence, sex and drugs.  I appreciate that they consider the messages children receive as something important to look at when viewing the health of a child.

This is a good introduction book for parents who want to learn more about how to think about how to keep kids healthy. It isn’t a book that you use to try and diagnose what illness your child may or may not have.  The last third of the book DOES explain most of the common illnesses that kids get most often and ways to use both conventional medicine and alternative treatments.  Illnesses covered: headaches, ear infections, gastrointestinal “tummy troubles”, reflux, colds and other respitory illnesses, allergies and asthma, and skin problems.  Also covered (briefly) are attention disorders and sleep issues.  In my opinion, both of those topics could be their own book when incorporating integrative medicine.

I have found this book to be a helpful resource on my bookshelf that I can pick up if we are dealing with an issue at home.  Like I mentioned earlier, this is a good intro book for anyone interested in learning more about integrative medicine.  It has a little bit of everything in it and can be handy to have around.

Happy Reading!

Do you use both conventional treatment and alternative treatment for illness?  Do you think homeopathics is a sham?  Have you thought about using a more alternative approach for treating illness?  What’s worked for you?

Recently, I have found myself becoming a “paranoid parent” with regard to my children’s health.  All the constant flooding of the news about the Swine Flu or H1N1 Flu has really got me worried.  It is especially worrisome to me because our son, who has Type 1 Diabetes, is at a greater risk of complications should he contract one of these viruses. 

So, last night, I sat down and had a long talk with God.  There are only so many things we as parents can do to protect our children, from the flu or anything for that matter, and I really needed to get my thoughts into perspective.  After my prayer time, I felt much more at peace and decided that I would be proactive and do what I could, but also have to trust God for His protection.

Here are some things you can do to help protect your kids from the seasonal flu and H1N1:

Wash Your Hands – We all know the importance of washing our hands to prevent spreading illness.  The Centers for Disease Control emphasize washing with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze.  Alcohol based hand-sanitizers are also a great weapon in the flu fight!

Avoid Touching Your Eyes and Mouth – Your eyes and mouth are great germ transmitters, so avoid biting your fingernails or playing with your eyelashes!

Cough or Sneeze Into Tissue – Coughing or sneezing into a tissue and throwing it away is the best way to get rid of your germs.  Make sure to wash your hands afterward.  If a tissue is not readily available, it is suggested that you cough or sneeze into your sleeve and NOT your hand.

Avoid Sick People – This seems like an easy one, right?  But reality is that we are exposed to sick people everyday at the grocery store, post office, or even at church.  Encourage your friends NOT to bring their kids over even if they “just have a runny nose, but no fever”.  Also, if one of your children gets sick, try to keep the others from playing with them until they have been fever free for at least 24 hours.

Sanitize Your Toys – I am guilty of not doing this as often as I should, but it’s great practice to take out the toys and sanitize them often, especially after a child is ill.  This will help prevent the spreading of “old germs” and possibly new ones. 

Get Vaccinated – Everyone in your family should get their annual flu shot.  It’s the best way to prevent contracting the flu.  If you are sensitive to the vaccine or agents in it, talk to your doctor or your child’s doctor about your options.  If your pediatrician’s office isn’t offering the flu vaccine or has run out (like mine did!), CVS and Walgreens walk-in clinics provide flu shots to children 18 months and older.  Contact your local one to see if they have the vaccine in stock before heading out. 

Pray – Let’s face it, we can do all of the things listed above and someone is still bound to get sick, so the best way to keep your sanity during this crazy time is to pray and trust God for His protection and health.  If nothing else, it’s a great way to to find peace!

For more information about the seasonal flu or the H1N1 virus, check out the CDC website or the government’s special flu website. 

What have you done to safeguard your family during this flu season? 

Photo Courtesy of itsv

This is a guest post from my friend, Dawn Craig.  I saw on Facebook that she did not recommend the movie ‘Astroboy’ so I asked her to explain. Here is Dawn’s review of the movie.

What ever happened to movies that are capable of portraying a valuable life lesson in a manner that is suitable for children? My husband and I recently took our two daughters (6 and 7) to watch Astroboy for what we thought would be a nice, entertaining evening – instead I spent almost the whole movie comforting my youngest and worrying about the nightmares they would have that night. I should have known things weren’t going to go well when within the first five minutes the little boy Toby (later referred to as Astroboy) is killed by a huge robot named the “Peacekeeper” (created by a government official to help him win his next term in office.)

Toby’s dad has a meltdown, (which any parent would do under the circumstances), and creates a robot identical to his lost son, including all of Toby’s childhood memories. Shortly after his creation, Toby’s dad rejects the boy and orders him to be destroyed. Another scientist saves the young boy and instead tells him to go find his purpose in life and sends this robot child out into the world alone. At this point my kids are already asking why his daddy wouldn’t want him and where was he going to go. I thought at this point it couldn’t get any worse and that surely the producers wouldn’t maintain this negative storyline throughout the whole movie – I was wrong.

The movie continues on with scenes of orphans being manipulated by the only father-figure in their life, numerous attempts to kill Astroboy, the “Peacekeeper” destroying the city, the second death of Astroboy, and so much more. In the end obviously the good guy wins, but unfortunately the much too negative path to get there disallows any positive message to be seen.

I can understand and appreciate a writer’s need to create storylines that not only entertain the children but can hold the adults attention as well. Unfortunately it seems they keep continuing to push the line and have lost sight of the impression they can have on a young mind. Needless to say I wouldn’t recommend this movie to anyone with small children.

Have you seen the movie? What did you think? Also, have you seen Where the Wild Things Are? Would you recommend it?

Proverbs 3: 21-24 

My son (daughter), let them not vanish from your sight;
         Keep sound wisdom and discretion, 
    So they will be life to your soul
         And adornment to your neck. 
    Then you will walk in your way securely
         And your foot will not stumble. 
    When you lie down, you will not be afraid;
         When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.

Oh sweet sleep, don’t we mothers wish for sweet sleep? The kind of sleep that is uninterrupted and makes you wake up in a good mood and feeling refreshed.  Proverbs 3:21 says that if we keep sound wisdom and discretion, then we can sleep well.  Merriam-Webster defines wisdom as “the ability to discern inner qualities and relationships, insight, & good sense.”  Discretion is defined as the “ability to make responsible decisions.”  I don’t know about you, but I sometimes have a hard time using good sense when things get a little crazy and I can’t think straight. It makes sense though, if we strive to make good decisions for our family and feel like we are doing the best we can, then we can sleep well.  We will have peace in our hearts knowing that we are doing the best we can to teach our children to learn good sense and make good choices for themselves.

All of us are doing the best we can to raise our children.  Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t feel like you are doing a good job, because you are!  Sleep in peace and don’t be afraid.  Let’s be adorned with wisdom and discretion so we can have life in our soul and sleep peacefully when we lie down!

Lord, please help me to be adorned with wisdom and discretion.  Help me make wise decisions with my family.  Please give me sound judgment when I need it.  Help me to be a good example of wisdom for my children to follow.  I pray that when I sleep that it will be sweet sleep.  I pray that my children & family have sweet sleep and rest.  Thank you for your gift of wisdom.  Amen.

The folks at Baby Einstein are exchanging or returning Baby Einstein DVDs, because their marketing used false claims that they will make your baby smarter.

You can mail in your DVD in exchange for a book, CD, or discount on a Little Einstein product at a Disney Store. OR you can get a refund of $15.99 for each DVD.

Here is a link for all the information about the Baby Einstein DVD exchange or refund.

What do you think of the Baby Einstein DVDs?

I don’t think I ever believed that they would make my baby smarter, because the DVDs were just going out of style when my babies were born. At the time I had my kids a lot of parents were already questioning the “smarter” claim. Neither of my children were interested in the videos whenever I played them. I have friends that have played them a lot. The videos are fine for entertaining.