Month: June 2019

Wife got a positive pregnancy test a week ago but the blood test was negative. Taking the final test today to see if it’s a chemical pregnancy or not. Hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst, and expecting it now by the looks of things…

Nurse Dani and Reva Cook (Licensed Clinical Social Worker) discuss how important it is for a mom to take care of herself.

Nurse Dani and Ali Jones (Lactation Consultant) discuss breastfeeding.

15% to 25% of adults and adolescents struggle with sleep disorders, and that might be falling asleep or staying asleep. And oftentimes, parents wonder if melatonin should be used. Before melatonin is used, you should try developing and consistently enforcing a regular bedtime schedule. Oftentimes, that will fix the problem and help children fall asleep and stay asleep better. Pick a bedtime routine that is appropriate for your child’s age and start it about 30 minutes before you want your child to fall asleep. And another thing to consider is blue light that is emitted from electronic devices. This could affect our body’s ability to understand that it’s night time and time to go to sleep, and so experts recommend avoiding the use of electronic devices that emit blue light about an hour prior to going to sleep.

There are a few things to consider when it comes to the use of melatonin, and one is that it’s not approved or regulated by the FDA, and thus, the purity and consistency of what you’re ingesting is not verified. It is not a sleep aid. It should not be used long-term. It can be used in short term instances where a child needs to get back on track maybe after a vacation or illness, and again, it should only be given after you’ve talked with your pediatrician, they’ve said that it’s appropriate for your child, and they’ve talked with you about a schedule and about dosing.

It may also be associated with a few side effects including increased night time bed-wetting, increased drowsiness in the morning, it may also affect the development and growth of a child (especially during puberty), and it can interact with other medications that a child is taking. And so, again, these are all good reasons to talk with your pediatrician before giving it to your child. If you have more questions in the future for me, feel free to ask them on our Intermountain Moms Facebook and Instagram pages, and recommend us to your friends and family too.

Parents have a love/hate relationship with pacifiers. If a baby will actually take a pacifier, then it can be helpful, especially when soothing them in public places and just getting them to wait a little bit longer until you’re able to feed them or to just help calm them down if nothing else is really helping. But inevitably, you’ll find yourself crawling on the floor underneath the crib trying to find it in the middle of the night when they wake up and they won’t go to sleep without it.

There are benefits to a child not taking a pacifier, the biggest one being that you never have to wean them from it, and so that makes life a little bit easier as your baby gets older. But you said that you want to try to introduce the pacifier to your baby that hasn’t taken it in the past, and there are some things that you can try. For one, keep in mind when you’re introducing the pacifier that a baby should be well-established on breastfeeding so that it doesn’t interfere with that. Once a baby is past that point, then you can try introducing it by just sticking it in their mouth and seeing if they take it, and some babies will and some won’t.

If yours doesn’t and you want to continue to encourage it, then wait till the very end of a nursing session or a bottle feeding when the baby is just a little bit drowsy, and doing the non-nutritive sucking, and it’s time to break the seal and stop the session all together. At that point, then break the seal if your nursing or pull the bottle out of the baby’s mouth and pop the pacifier into your baby’s mouth. And if they start to suck on it and do well, then great. You just may trick them a little bit when they’re tired and they’ll continue sucking. And if you do this a few times a day with most of the feedings during the day, then after a few days, then they may just take the pacifier and learn to like it.

If this isn’t working, then under the same circumstances when your baby is drowsy and at the very end of a feeding, stick the pacifier into your baby’s mouth and then just tug it back slightly. You’re going to use reverse psychology a little bit. And when you tug back slightly, the baby will actually start to suck on it a little bit harder. And so, again, if you do this a few times a day, then after a few days, the baby may take a pacifier. But if all else fails and they don’t, then that’s okay and there are other things that you can try to sooth your baby with.

You can try swaddling, you can try swaying, and you can try sound. Swaddling is comforting to babies, because they’re used to being swaddled in the womb. And they like sounds, because they’re also used to hearing the sound of a heartbeat, and the blood swishing through her body, and digestive noises when they’re inside of you, and so sounds like white noise are very comforting to babies. They also like swaying motions, so that’s why, instinctively, when we hold a baby, we all just naturally start rocking them. So you can try these things if your baby is a little bit fussy and they’re not taking a pacifier.

If you have more questions or concerns about, talk with your pediatrician and they can give you tailored information and advice. And if you have more questions in the future for me, feel free to ask them on our Intermountain Moms Facebook and Instagram pages, and recommend us to your friends and family too.