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Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Signs the end is near, for pregnant women

Ok, sensational title for a actual personal event. Yet, it is a real event and we all wondered what is going on in our body as we waited for labor to start. First off the powers that be American Collage of Obsetrics and Gynacology(ACOG), just a group of doctors, decided that pregnancy is too long so they decided to shorten it. However,God made it to be 42 weeks.You are not overdue until 42 weeks.It is not 38 weeks like these humans want it to be. These guys also think on the whole that c-sections are a reasonable mode of delivery and include reasons to do c/s beyond life saving measures.They are able to do "something" and get more money for it.Your body births your baby, ever wonder why they call it delivery? So,they set the image that they are absolutely necessary.That said; I personally needed an emergency c/s in '83 and it saved both our lives. When I became pregnant the next year, I had no hope of a vaginal birth,mainly because my incision inside came apart and needed to be fixed and there was danger to me of hemorrage. So, I am not against c/s! I want women to be informed and understand that birth does not need to be a surgical event for every pregnancy.
But this is about the signs that you are starting labor. It will start in the 36 week range with achy joints. Why? A hormone called Relaxin is slowly increasing in your body to soften your sacral cartilage so you can physically pass the baby.Baby also helps with increased weight and pressure as they hopefully settle head down in the top of the birth canal. Move carefully and avoid climbing and heavy lifting.You could easily hurt your back or fall in this period of time.Use heat or cold packs to achy spots, warm showers or baths are helpful too. Avoid aspirin and Nsaids because they can thin your blood. You are about to give birth and you don't need to bleed too much,so avoid things that thin it. Eat spinach and green leafy veggies for the vitamin K.
The next early events may be an assumed case of food poisoining. WHAT??? Yes,as you start to have minor contractions and shifting positions of the baby on your bowels it may cause diarrea and cramping. These are random, gassy cramps without rythmn so are not often recognised until after. Of course,eat carefully during pregnancy. Eat clean,wholesome food in moderation and not to excess. DON"T eat a half gallon of ice cream in a sitting, you will have gas and cramps that have nothing to do with labor! Avoid large amounts of dairy, spicy or fast foods. These can aggravate gallbladders and that is extremely painful,and you have to suffer thru it,so just be wise what you eat.You may also have a return of "morning sickness" or smell aversion, another change in hormones as you prepare. There are studies that suggest that these hormones interact with the baby and that the baby stimulates the actual labor. That would then go against the wive's tales of taking castor oil to cause loose stools to get things going. It only empties you and possibly weakens you right when you need strength.
Finally (for this post), Braxton Hicks contractions. These are real contractions however they are light, and a sign that the uterus is irritated. Commonly this is caused by dehydration. Ok, so get dehydrated and get things going! Right?? Absolutely NOT! The amniotic fluid is very important to support the baby off the umbilical cord, it(the fluid) also is being ingested and "breathed in" by the baby. It needs to be cycled every 12 hours or so to support, and prevent infection,remove waste products and prevent stress to the baby.To top that off, when you go to a hospital birth they start an IV and it will stop those in 5 minutes flat.So your bill is bigger and you wasted time and had to have painful things done to you; that you will just have to do again when you come in for the real thing.How can you tell the difference?You can't always tell. The discomfort especially for first time moms is real and follows the timing and duration,so let's go.
Not so fast. You really don't want to go unless you have been told differently for individual purposes. Labor takes sometimes weeks. Your caregiver will give you a time frame of when to go.This will be like "when your contractions are 5 minutes apart for an hour come and get checked." During that time drink water. If you were resting when it started ,get up and gently move around. Do the dishes,or take a shower.If you were moving around when they start ,sit or lay down,drinking your water. I mean a bottle or more, no sipping, DRINK! If you need a c/s they will make you throw up so don't worry ,(unless you are preparing for a c/s in less than 10 hours). Well this is overlong, I will probably add more in another posting.If you have questions, ask your doctor, and send me a comment. Always ask questions. They are good for you.

Friday, September 9, 2011

What are we saying?

I spent the day with a lovely friend recently. We chatted and I did what I love; gave advice. While we were together I noted a pattern of speech that I recognised. It is the tendency to profess guilt or bad habits. She would say "another bad habit I have" or "I am guilty of". I hope I was able to dispel this for her. We had a wonderful visit . I keep coming back to these ideoms. In America especially we speak against ourselves. I personally am a Christian but even secular psycology espouses self prediction or self fulfilling prophecy. The gist is you will follow what you hear, and if you don't guard what you hear ;you will agree with what you hear and your mind will work towards fulfilling it. It is the basis of all advertising and manipulation. The Bible says that "as a man thinks so shall he go". Ok, no preaching... but if you go with a secular example:in the 1970's a man wrote about his battle with chronic back pain. Doctors gave him a negative report and sent him home without hope. He rented a hotel room and gathered every comedic media,film and book he could find and watched them. He had a remarkable recovery and wrote about it.

The Use Of Humour In Stress Management
By Sylvia Mauger

Stress News July 2001 Vol.13 No.3


There is no doubt that any form of counselling, be it psychotherapy, stress management or anything else, is a very serious business. We read so many serious texts and go to so many serious meetings and classes that it is easy to get into a mode of solemn gravity. And, of course, this is largely because we are committed to treating our clients with respect. But in this paper I would like to suggest that respect can include humour and that laughter during a counselling session can be very therapeutic.


Humour: what is it and what place does it have in stress management counselling?

The Oxford Concise Dictionary defines humour as 'the quality of being amusing or comic; the ability to perceive or express humour or take a joke', but this is not particularly helpful in therapeutic terms. What is amusing or comic to one person may not be to another and, of course, we are not in the business of entertaining our clients as comics. So if humour is not necessarily about telling a joke, then what is it and how can it have beneficial effects in stress management counselling?

Windy Dryden, writing in Brief Rational Emotive Therapy, quotes Albert Ellis saying 'that one way of conceptualising psychological disturbance is that it is the tendency of humans to take themselves, other people and life conditions TOO seriously.' He goes on to describe how, in order to change, negative events need to be taken seriously, but that if they are taken too seriously, emotional disturbance may follow and action for change can be impaired. Indeed, as the whole model of stress management as conceived in Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is based on the idea that people suffer emotional dysfunction when their thinking is irrational, humour can be seen as one of the many ways of 'untwisting' a client's cognitive distortions.

Of course, this does not imply that every stress management counsellor can laugh and joke their way through every session with every client, but it does mean that if a counsellor is sensitive to the mood of the client, a little humour can go a long way. If the therapeutic bond is comfortable, it will be clear to the client that the therapist is not laughing at the client but at the irrationality of her/his ideas. Laughing with people is compassionate, laughing at them is immoral and unethical. Indeed, it can often be the case that laughing together can act, not only as a tool of communication, but can strengthen the bond between the two people concerned. As Victor Borge, the American entertainer, once wrote, 'Laughter is the shortest distance between two people'. (quoted by Robert Holden, ISMA)


The physiology of humour

It is well known that stress causes physiological changes that are dangerous when prolonged Cortisol levels and blood pressure are elevated and the heart rate is increased amongst a host of other stress triggered responses. There is now considerable research that suggests that laughter lowers cortisol levels and stimulates the immune system, off-setting the immunosuppresive effects of stress. (Patty Wooton, Humour: An Antidote for Stress).

This research was preceded in 1979 by Norman Cousins who had, through his personal experience, attracted the attention of the medical profession to the possible therapeutic effects of humour. He contracted ankylosing spondylitis in 1964 and decided that the hospital regime of strong medication, dull food and the institutional regime was so depressing that any benefits he was gaining could be maximised outside the conventional regime. So, based on his own research, he developed a programme of therapy consisting of megadoses of a mix of vitamin C combined with regular doses of laughter stimulated by re-runs of the Marx Brothers films and Candid Camera. These treatments of belly laughs appeared to relieve his pain considerably and, indeed, when his levels of inflammation were tested, they were found to have decreased. Cousins also asserted that the increased release of endorphins caused by laughter eased the pain.

I assert that not just pain levels but point of view is affected by our words and the activities we partake of. Watch uplifting media, laugh, do activies you personally ENJOY.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Continued

I am so annoyed, working on the award post and I could not figure how to open it again to add the last 2 award nominees! Well here they are;

Linsey at Artsy-Fartsy Mama
http://feeds.feedburner.com/Artsy-fartsyMama

and Sarah at Emmyloubeedoo
emmyloubeedoo.blogspot.com/

I nominate each of these ladies because of their consistant excellance. Thank you Ladies!

Me an Award?

Alison at Heavenly Handmades has given me an award from the Liebster Blog. I didn't even know you knew me!(giggle) Seriously I am unsure of how to work this promotion so If I miss things feel free to help!
BTW check out Alisons blog Heavenly Handmades at http://heavenlyhandmades.blogspot.com/ she shares crafty things and about her homebirth. Both good things.

Here are the rules for the Liebster Blog:
1. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
2. Reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Post the award on your blog.

Thank you Alison from Heanenly handmades for giving me this award, head over to her brilliant blog and say hi!

Now to pick 5 brilliant blogs to hand it on to;

Vanessa at Nifty Thrifty Things
niftythriftythings.blogspot.com/

Laura Beth at a Step in the Journey
astepinthejourney.blogspot.com/

Lindsey at Arsty-Fartsy Mama
feeds.feedburner.com

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Grapes


Early in August my family went to visit my BFF in Fort White. She thought we were coming to surprise her DH for a belated surprise birthday party. Curiously,she planned it for her birtday weekend. Sooo we turned the surprise on her and sang the birthday song to her at the last minute. Her husband and I shrieked with laughter at her surprise! She was ...annoyed. To escape any good natured wrath I decided to go pick some pears. While on my way I was invited to pick some of those grapes too. Apparently my friend doesn't know what she has in 3 rows of grape vines producing tremendous grapes!! I got 2 grocery bags full. I also picked 2 bags of sand pears. Most of those were hard but yellow so I got what I could expect to handle. The grapes were muscdine and scuppernog. Most were ripe and they were sweet!After eating off my stash for a couple of days I decided to make jelly and fruit rollups. I got a recipe off the net and improvised from there. I mixed all the grapes together and the jelly came out a pretty rose color. It is looser than I like but it tast great. I held some of the grapes in reserve for munching but my eyes were too big!. I had peeled and dried most of the pears, but several were not ripe yet. Well the day they were ripe I peeled them and they were so juciy I couldn't chop them into pieces. They were crumbling(wet) in my hands. So I put them in the blender with the left over grapes and purred them. I then put the puree into the dehydrater and made hard candy. Not the expected result. I tried two times before i found the secret to fruit leather~ oil the pan first. It was dramaticly different on all points. It dried faster it was pliable and not sticky. Definately a new house treat. But what about trial 1 and 2? I made uglyies. Yeah they were ugly but tasted so good. Basicly the dried(?) sticky mess was pried up with a dinner knife and each chunk and strip was dredged in corn starch.I put these in a mason jar and they are a favorite of my grown son and grankids.Waste not!