Baby names- How to pick one when you don’t know the gender?

About 5 more weeks to go before the baby arrives. Yet I have not really chosen a name for the baby. Why? Because I’m not 100% confident whether it will be a “he” or “she”.
The doctor said it will be a boy, again! The third in a row, to be exact. Not that I have anything against boys. I always prefer boys than girls. Don’t really know why. Maybe because I myself do not have a sister other than a distant half-sister. I grew up with 2 younger brothers. So never really had close interaction with other females besides my mum. The closest I have ever been with other girls is when I stayed in the hostel during my university years. Even then, I kept to myself whenever possible. It was simply the best thing to do. Because I just can’t stand conflicts. And with everyone with a completely different background, misunderstandings are just waiting to happen. So, better steer away from the dangerous ground.

Now back to baby names. I’ve gathered here some websites available dedicated to baby’s names. Hope other mommies out there can get some inspiration from it.

http://christianity.about.com/od/christainbabyboynames/a/boynamesab.htm
http://christianity.about.com/od/christianbabygirlnames/a/babygirlnames.htm
http://www.babyhold.com/list/Chinese_Baby_Names/
http://www.milligazette.com/misl/muslim_islam_islamic_baby_names_girl_boy_name.htm
http://www.thinkbabynames.com/search/1/jewish
http://hinduism.about.com/library/babynames/bl-babynames-index.htm
http://www.baby.org.my/

Preparing for baby's arrival - third time around.

Currently in my 35th week of pregnancy. Yet somehow I got a feeling that the baby will come out sooner than expected, just like my previous two. Recently bought a plastic drawer for the baby's clothes and stuffs. Planning to set up the crib in a few days time. Did the laundry for HALF of the old baby's clothes. Another half to be done maybe tomorrow. Still preparing the birth bag. Will need to buy maternity pads and baby's toiletries. Hope I have enough time to prepare everything.

Mother's stress has impact on her view of child's behaviour.

NEW YORK: Mothers with a history of prenatal drug use who are stressed out by parenting are known to view their babies as more reactive, and as having a more difficult temperament. Now, a new study shows that this is as true for stressed-out moms with no history of drug use.
The findings suggest that it is possible to help women cope better with their parenting role by focusing on their individual characteristics, "and not on whether they used drugs before or after pregnancy," according to study author Dr. Stephen J. Sheinkopf, of Brown Medical School in Rhode Island."If mothers are highly stressed as parents, this will affect the ways that they think about and interact with their babies. This can have long term effects on how children develop and how families function," he added.

As the researchers report in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology, an infant's behavior at 1 month of age predicted both the mother's ratings of the infant's temperament at 4 months and the mother's level of parenting stress.
In particular, extreme reactivity among young infants, as determined by an objective assessment of factors as varied as the infant's posture, movement, irritability, and consolability, predicted higher ratings of the infant's reactivity a few months later by their mothers. This was primarily true for mothers who reported higher levels of parenting-related stress, however, the researchers found.
"This is saying moms who are exposed to a lot of stress in parenting may be sensitive to their child's behavior in a way that makes them view their child as more difficult, more reactive," Sheinkopf said.
"Because we now know that this effect is true both for mothers with and without a history of drug use, this supports our view that we can help mothers with drug use problems be happier and more effective parents," the researcher explained.
Sheinkopf added that "though this is not a treatment study, it would suggest that moms should seek out help and utilize help out there to be happy, successful, well-adjusted parents." - Reuters

To be or not to be... an unmarried teen mother

NEW YORK - IN the new hit movie Juno and now in real life with Jamie Lynn Spears, 16-year-old girls get pregnant and decide to bear the child rather than opt for abortion. For social conservatives, it's a challenging story line - they condemn the teen sex but hail the ensuing choice.
Mr Bill Maier, a vice president of the conservative ministry Focus on the Family, said,
'We should commend girls like Jamie Lynn Spears for making a courageous decision to have the baby. On the other hand, there's nothing glamorous or fun about being an unwed teen mother.'

Spears, younger sister of pop star Britney Spears, has said she plans to raise her child in her home state of Louisiana.

The news about Spears was greeted with mixed emotions by Ms Leslie Unruh, a Sioux Falls, South Dakota, activist who has campaigned against abortion and for abstinence-only sex education. 'When I heard the story, I felt sad at first,' Ms Unruh said. 'Already her life is not the norm of other 16-year-old girls.You have a lot of teens who look at those people as role models,' she said. 'There's a danger of them thinking: 'She got pregnant? I guess I can have a baby too.' The message from Ms Unruh and others: It's not that simple.

The Roman Catholic Church, while firmly opposed to premarital sex, embraces the message that adoption is among the best options if an unmarried teen does become pregnant, said Ms Deirdre McQuade, a spokesman for the US Catholic Bishops Conference.
'The admirable choice for an unplanned pregnancy is to make the best parenting plan possible - whether that means making all the sacrifices necessary to raise the child or generously placing him or her in an adoptive family,' Ms McQuade said.

Juno is the latest in a series of recent movies in which the heroine, faced with an unexpected pregnancy, chooses not to have an abortion.
Dr Vanessa Cullins, vice-president for medical affairs at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said these story lines - generally with upbeat endings - oversimplify the tough choices facing real-life girls and women. Each year, more than 1 million of them in the United States opt to have an abortion.
'In the real world, it's important to weigh all the possible options and then come up with the best one for the teen, the family and the child,' Dr Cullins added. 'That will be different for different circumstances.'

National statistics released earlier this month showed the teen birth rate on the rise for the first time in 15 years.

Ms Demie Kurz, a sociologist who co-directs the University of Pennsylvania's women's studies program, noted that the Juno heroine and Jamie Lynn Spears come from well-off families and do not represent the many girls from low-income backgrounds who get pregnant.
'Some of them have the babies as part of their path to what they see as adulthood, but they often put their education on hold, and it makes life a lot tougher,' Ms Kurz said.
'Do we want to put burdens on these teenage girls by encouraging them to think that having a baby is cool?' She said it was reflective of the US political climate that few movies depict abortion as a valid option.

While Jamie Lynn Spears may have the financial resources to raise her child in comfort, psychotherapist Linda Perlman Gordon of Chevy Chase, Maryland, - who has written about teenage girls - said daunting emotional challenges likely await.
'Having to be a selfless parent is totally contradictory to the development of a teenager,' Ms Gordon said. 'To do it right, she's got to subsume her needs. She's going to have to give up the part of growing that would have allowed her to become an autonomous, independent person.' -- AP

Housewife gave birth in a fire engine

In Malaysia, a 33-year-old housewife gave birth to her second child in a fire-engine while being brought to a hospital yesterday.The three-tonne vehicle was used to get to a village clinic as an ambulance could not go into the area which was flooded since last week. Mdm Norizan gave birth to a baby boy, weighing 2.7kg, about 9am while the vehicle was nearing the hospital. A doctor and two nurses were in the vehicle.

Norizan, who also has a 4-year-old son, said she was glad that the baby was delivered without any complications.She had moved to her mother-in-law's house after her house was submerged in water.The baby was due in a week's time but Norizan said she started to feel pain about 4.30am and asked her husband to send her to the clinic."I was there for over two hours when the pain got worse. Nurses there then decided to call for an ambulance to send me to the clinic."However, the ambulance could not come and they had to call the fire department to send a fire-engine," she said.
Meanwhile, Fire and Rescue Department officer-in-charge Saiful Bahri Mohd Noor said the district firemen were not only deployed to rescue flood victims but also help send pregnant women, like Norizan, to the hospital.He added that since the floods hit the district a week ago, they had sent four pregnant women to hospitals, including the latest case.

Mums make better bosses

Katherine Ellison, the author of "The Mommy Brain - How Motherhood Makes Us Smarter", knows what she is talking about for she is a working journalist in America and is also the proud mother of two.
Experiments on virgin, pregnant and maternal mice are borne out by the experiences of female humans. Only more so.
'New mothers are bombarded with unfamiliar and intense experiences and it is likely that their brains undergo a period of intense reorganisation,' Ms Ellison writes.
'And the need to look after their offspring makes women more focused and resourceful, more aggressive and less susceptible to fear.'

As human mothers learn to interpret and meet the needs of their babies, they develop skills that help them relate to others. Mothers (and fathers) become experts at non-verbal communication, on which most human interaction is based. Every employer wants people with drive. Another plus for mum.

Ms Ellison quotes neurologist Paul MacLean, who argues that the assumption that mothers focus all their attention on the well-being of their own family is not the full story.
'In fact, women convert their concern for their own children into concern for other members of the species.'
Ms Ellison suggests that motherhood increases employability in four main areas - ability to coordinate under pressure, dependability, leadership and care-giving.

Motherhood promotes skills such as team-building, mentoring and conflict resolution, which are also invaluable at work.

Can childbirth boost an athlete's performance?

TOKYO: A series of successes by recent mothers has prompted questions whether childbirth, far from spelling the end of a sporting career, can actually boost an athlete's performance.

Paula Radcliffe's sensational New York marathon win this month, after having her first child in January, followed Jana Rawlinson's return from childbirth to win world 400-metre hurdles gold in Osaka in August.Japan also cheered as double Olympic judo champion Ryoko Tani won her seventh under-48kg world crown - and her first as a mum - in September.

All three said the rigours of pregnancy and labour had improved them as athletes by giving them more confidence and even making them stronger."I do think it gives you an extra inner strength as well and extra balance as a person," Paula said.

"Swollen breasts, a loose pelvis and, in the case of a Caesarian section, damaged abdominal muscles, pose a significant challenge to the returning sportswoman, affecting not just fitness but also balance, experts say."It is also quite tough to undergo full-scale training in parallel to breastfeeding," Akira Namba, a doctor of obstetrics and gynaecology at the Saitama Medical University hospital, said.

However, modern training techniques and a growing scientific awareness are enabling many athletes to overcome the difficulties.

Pregnancy and childbirth are quite demanding on the body, so going through that must make somebody stronger afterwards," Patrick O'Brien of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists told the BBC.

One theory suggests that childbirth boosts athletic prowess by raising the flow of androgen and other hormones. In psychological terms, a new arrival in the family can have a positive effect on the athlete's awareness.

"There is some truth about them saying that mummies come back strong," a beaming Rawlinson said after her Osaka win."As a mummy, you can do anything." - AFP

Towards safe motherhood. The facts.

Every year, 529,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes.
This means that more than 1 million children are left motherless and vulnerable.
Children who have lost their mothers are up to 10 more times more likely to die prematurely than those who haven’t.

More than 80 per cent of maternal deaths worldwide are due to five direct causes: haemorrhage, sepsis, unsafe abortion, obstructed labour and hypertensive disease of pregnancy.

Most maternal deaths (61 per cent) take place during labour, delivery or in the immediate post-partum period.

Some 3.4 million newborns die within the first week of life.

The risk of a woman dying as a result of pregnancy or childbirth during her lifetime is about 1 in 7 in Afghanistan and Sierra Leone compared with about 1 in 30,000 in Sweden.

More than 10 million women a year suffer severe or long-lasting illnesses or disabilities, from obstetric fistula to infertility, depression and impoverishment caused by complications of pregnancy or childbirth.

Third trimester nausea

I'm currently in my third trimester. 32 weeks to be exact. Can't really figure out the reason for feeling nauseous besides the fact that my tummy has ballooned to the chest. So maybe it's pushing at the heart resulting in heartburn. It could also be due to slower digestion during pregnancy. Whatever it is, I just can't wait for all this to end.

When your child stutters..

Stuttering is a disorder that involves hesitation, repetition, or stumbling while speaking.

According to MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia, some young children stutter in response to stress, fatigue, or excitement. Stuttering can also be triggered if a child feels rushed, self-conscious, or pressured. Whatever the trigger, most children outgrow the problem.

According to www.childrenhospital.org, Normal developmental stuttering may occur when the child is between the ages of 18 months and 5 years. This may include repeating words or phrases, poor pronunciation of words, leaving out words or sounds, and speaking some words that are hard to recognize.

I find that it is amazing to know that normal developmental stuttering and speech difficulties happen in about 90 percent of children. True stuttering happens in only about 1 percent of children. True stuttering occurs more often in boys than in girls.

I'm not really sure if my son is stuttering or not. It just that he has the habit of repeating a few particular words when talking. Not every word that is. We are trying to remove this habit before he starts schooling in less than 3 weeks time.

Financial worries causing me to have prenatal depression

From what I had read, at least one in ten pregnant women suffers from bouts of depression.
I am in that 10% category. Hormonal changes are making me feel more anxious than usual. Most of the time I'm either upset or very sad. Tears would be rolling down my cheek unnecessarily. The worse part is my children would be the ones taking the effects.

I'm positive that I am depressed because I have at least 2 of these symptoms:

• A sense that nothing feels enjoyable or fun anymore
• Feeling blue, sad, or "empty" for most of the day, every day
• It's harder to concentrate
• Extreme irritability or agitation or excessive crying
• Trouble sleeping or sleeping all the time
• Extreme or never-ending fatigue
• A desire to eat all the time or not wanting to eat at all.
• Inappropriate guilt or feelings of worthlessness or hopelessness

I hate being depressed but I just don't know what to do about it.

Fighting for the computer with a 4-years old son

How I missed my alone time. That would be not less than 4 years ago! Nowadays the only alone time I can have is in the toilet. I'm trying so hard to earn some income from the net. But everytime I'm sitting in front of the computer my son would be breathing down my neck. After about 10 minutes, he would start whining to get to play on the computer. Not wanting to lose my energy scolding him, I would let him use the PC. He can sit for hours playing games. Usually I try to get the PC back after half an hour but he just wouldn't budge. That's when it start to get on my nerve. After 1 hour, I would just give up and leave him. Sometimes he's not comfortable to be left alone, sometimes he just didn't care. Now my only wish is for another PC so we don't need to share anymore.

Why you should take better care of pregnant women.

WASHINGTON - PLUMP babies may really be happier babies, Canadian and British researchers reported people who had a low birth weight were more likely to have depression and anxiety later in life.

'We found that even people who had just mild or moderate symptoms of depression or anxiety over their life course were smaller babies than those who had better mental health,' he said in a statement. 'It suggests a dose-response relationship. As birth weight progressively decreases, it's more likely that an individual will suffer from mood disorders later in life.'

Asst Prof Colman said it is possible that when mothers are stressed, stress hormones are passing through the placenta to the foetus.

'One of the surprising findings from our research was that people who had worse mental health throughout their lives had also reached developmental milestones, like standing and walking for the first time, later in life than those who had better mental health.'

Not all small babies are fated to have poor mental health, the researchers said. 'Being born small isn't necessarily a problem. It is a problem if you were born small because of adverse conditions in the womb - and low birth weight is what we looked at in this study because it is considered a marker of stress in the womb,' Asst Prof Colman said.
'When a mother is really stressed, blood flow to the uterus is restricted and the fetus gets fewer nutrients, which tends to lead to lower birth weight.'

Other studies have linked low birth weight to a higher risk of diabetes and heart disease in later life.

'I have been asked by many people what the 'take-home message' of this study is, and I would say that, in the simplest terms, it is 'We should take better care of pregnant women',' he said.

Maternal deaths 2003 - 2005 = Why mothers die.

A series of reports called "Saving mothers' lives" presents the findings of the confidential enquiries into maternal deaths in the UK during 2003-2005.

The report states that obesity and shortage of trained midwives is the reason behind the sudden increase in maternal deaths.

According to the report there were 295 deaths between 2003 and 2005, leaving 520 children mother-less.

It also found that women from poorer backgrounds were up to seven times more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications.

About 40 per cent of deaths were preventable, it added.

Tuesday's report criticised doctors for failing to identify and manage common medical conditions or potential emergencies outside their immediate area of expertise.

The report also states that half of the mothers who died are overweight, while 1 in 7 falls in the obese category.

Obese pregnant women are more at risk of dying, suffering heart disease, miscarriage, diabetes, infections and blood clots.

Although the death rate has not changed significantly since 2000, it has risen by around 40 per cent since 1985/87, the study showed.

The report said that maternal obesity was now a 'major and growing risk factor for maternal death'.
It called for more pre-conception counselling and advice for obese woman to help tackle the problem.

To co-sleep or not to co-sleep.

We have been sleeping in the same room for nearly 5 years now. All 4 of us. Me, my husband, my nearly 5 yrs old son, and another 30 months old son. In 2 months time, another child will probably occupy the same room. So far all of us keeps alternating, consciously or unconsciously, between the queen-sized bed and the single-sized matress. I'm not really sure when this pattern will stop. I'm starting to worry if it's actually good or bad for the children. So, have been surfing the net and found out that there are some benefits of co-sleeping for children:

1) One study reported mothers getting more sleep by co-sleeping and breastfeeding than by other arrangements.
2) Stress hormones are lower in mothers and babies who co-sleep, specifically the balance of the stress hormone cortisol, the control of which is essential for a baby's healthy growth.
3) The physiology of co-sleeping babies is more stable, including more stable temperatures, more regular heart rhythms, and fewer long pauses in breathing than babies who sleep alone.
4) Co-sleeping promotes long-term emotional health.
In long-term follow-up studies of infants who slept with their parents and those who slept alone, the children who co-slept were happier, less anxious, had higher self-esteem, were less likely to be afraid of sleep, had fewer behavioral problems, tended to be more comfortable with intimacy, and were generally more independent as adults.

Work + motherhood = healthier women

Guess what, according to scientists in London, juggling a career along with being a wife or partner and parent may help to keep women healthy.

After analysing data from a study that tracked the health of Britons born in 1946, they found that women who had multiple roles were less likely than homemakers, single mothers or childless females to report poor health or to be obese in middle age.

"It looks like women are relatively healthy as a result of combining work and family life."

The researchers found that women who had been homemakers most of their lives were most likely to report poor health, followed by single mothers and childless women.

Guilt-free motherhood

(Book review)

If you are serious in wanting to be a 'good' mother to your children, or are seeking some assurances to the doubts and worries that are plaguing you as you muddle through motherhood, this book may show you a way - the only way - according to the author, Dr Julianna Slattery.

You have only to place yourself in God's hands and bow to his wisdom, says Slattery, a Christian psychologist and speaker. This mother of three boys offers an innovative approach to tackling motherhood - with the Bible as the blueprint, and God's words your guide.

She warns that she is not writing a how-to book. Rather than tell you what to do, she hopes to challenge how you think; and in doing so, to walk with her to seek God's strength and wisdom as mothers. With this in mind, she starts off by talking about the trials of being a mother, its demands and expectations, and moving from reactive to proactive motherhood - all the while touching on why we need to look in the scriptures for answers and guidance.

According to Slattery, the key to unlock the many puzzling difficulties mothers face is 'wisdom', and the beginning of wisdom is "fear of the Lord". For it is by instilling a fear of the Lord in our children that we teach them the boundaries of morality, the difference between right and wrong, good and evil, and to obey the standards that God has laid down.

In the second part of her book, she pinpoints the seven parenting pillars of wisdom - PURPOSE:
1) Productivity,
2) Uncompromising integrity,
3) Restrained speech,
4) Positive relationships,
5) Openness to feedback,
6) Self-control, and
7) Eye to the future.

Each of these themes is a characteristic of maturity and helps us focus our influence by setting specific goals for our children's development, she writes. Slattery also underlines the need for mothers to come to terms with the limits of their wisdom for there are elements of parenting we cannot control - illness, death, our children's choices. We can do everything right and still never be guaranteed happy, healthy, God-fearing children.

Recognising these limits and understanding them will free us from the grip of guilt.

Finally, Slattery tells us what to do with our guilt and how we can look to God to help us avoid the pitfalls of pride, selfishness and possessiveness over our children.

Would you give birth in a cow shed?

KATMANDU, Nepal - In the mountains of tradition-bound Nepal, women give birth the way they always have: in the cow shed.
When labor begins, they are sent out of the house, because bleeding associated with childbirth is seen as polluting. Most give birth on dirty rags or simply on the shed's cow-dung floor, sometimes with a local midwife helping. After the birth, the midwife routinely pummels or steps on the new mother's abdomen 'to get the bad blood out.'
Those traditional practices - combined with an often four-hour walk to the nearest health facility, an average marriage age of 16 and a tradition of unsafe abortions of unwanted female fetuses - are key reasons the country's maternal mortality rate has long been among the highest in the world, health experts say.