It has been a whole year since I have posted on this site but I have been posting on my other blog sites. I come back here to tell you I am 38 weeks pregnant and getting ready to birth and breastfeed for the sixth time. I feel great. My husband is anxious for the babies arrival and I feel like a watched kettle but I am enjoying this extra time. With the baby still inside me I know it is quieter and easier than it will be a week from now! I am drinking lots of hot chocolate and taking short walks (I waddle very slowly).

I just had Zoe get her MMR vaccine and while at the doctors office we started to talk about a book by Ben Elton called "Blind Faith". He is a British comedian and writer and he is always very relevant. In the UK there has been a lot of controversy over vaccines in recent years. But what people tend to forget is that prior to vaccines childhood illness had huge mortality and morbidity. We are very lucky today we never give a thought to our healthy babies living past five years old. But not so very long ago this was a huge worry for all families alike. Without vaccines we had no protection against illness like tetanus, of which the spores are everywhere in the ground, and polio also endemic. Personally I am very greatful for vaccines and am going to take advantage of medical advances to ensure the health of my children.

Having said this not all vaccines are the same in that each one is targeted at a different disease and each disease is very different. So if the disease itself does not threaten the well being of our children then it is truely optional. Chicken pox vaccine was recently introduced but the risk benefit of the vaccine is not the same as that for polio. All five of my children got the disease not the vaccine over christmas this year and none of them will even remember the incident. I am glad because now they are not at risk of getting chicken pox as adults when it has a much longer coarse. The vaccine does wear out and so even if vaccinated you could get the disease as an adult. Not many people realise that the vaccine is mainly offered so that parents don't have to take time off work to be with a sick child if that is not an issue for you feel free to decline the chicken pox vaccine for your child.

Yes the decision to vaccine is not easy but maybe we should break it down a little more and say to ourselves which disease do I need to protect my children against and how?

My fifth baby has been the easiest to breastfeed. I am not sure why this is but I have many theories. None of which I can prove conclusively and that is what makes it tough to advise other parents. Very little about parenting has been proven. In fact the whole science is a work in progress.
That is why if it works for you and your baby it is good. Of course sharing your ideas with other parents can be very helpful but if they don't adopt your methods don't be offended.

Often I am told that my baby has very good head control for her/his age. This happens when they are usually very small less than 3 months. My GP mentioned that this maybe another one of the many benefits of breastfeeding. As the baby must use her/his head to root for the breast they develop the neck muscles. After 5 years of breastfeeding I am so glad I have a new reason to be happy.

Can you spot the bottle of champagne in this photo of Zoe?

To vaccinate or not to vaccinate that is the question?

Many people ask me if I have vaccinated the children. They ask me because I am a physician and mother and because they consider me a special case as I have had 5 home births. The choice to have a home birth of course has nothing to do with vaccinations.
I have vaccinated all my children.

Parents are in a tough position as we have too much information available and not enough good filters.
Parents who are thinking of not vaccinating often quote the link with autism and I never refute this concern.
I start on solid ground :
BUT why do we have vaccines?
Do you know what diseases they do treat?
Do you know about Polio? Risk? Incidence? etc.
If you are choosing for your child not to be vaccinated you are opening them up to disease risks and you need to know what these are before you opt out.

The diseases there are vaccines available for have known identifiable causes and good confirmed statistics to go with them. So you can start here.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine
If your child gets a disease that is entirely preventable you will have nobody to turn to.
Not to take time to inform yourself would be terribly expensive in the long run.

This is Zoë Anaïs our girl asleep after breastfeeding. And you can see my Nurse-well in the background of this photo. "As much as my baby drinks, I drink" should be my moto. 

She was born 8lbs 14oz and after two weeks weighted in at 9lbs 3oz 

I, on the other hand, have lost all my pregnancy weight and am still eating chocolates from Zurich my favorite. 

Diet and Breastfeeding

I get questions all the time about what we should and should not be eating while breastfeeding.

Important to know when you start breastfeeding is that you are using 500 extra calories (when the baby is using you as his or her only source of nutrition).
That is a lot. And your metabolic rate is high all day long. So you can afford to and need to consistently eat more to keep the balance. What most people don't realize is you need to drink more too, just like when you excercise and burn calories you replace fluids. To metabolize fat we need a lot of water and to make breastmilk you are metabolizing fat.

It is always good to eat a healthy and balanced diet. After that it is good to watch for things you and/or your baby react to eliminating them from the diet is fine as long as over all you have all food groups covered. Diet is a huge issue as we all have to eat eveyday and what we eat affects how we feel. Diet is also a very personal issue so I try not to generalize - what works for one person may not be great for an other.
I am always happy to answer specific questions.

My husband and I are always over estimating our abilities as parents tonight we thought we could manage 3 boys under 3 years at a sushi restaurant. It was a last minute descission on our way home from shopping so we had made no preparation.
Well boy was I glad my youngest is still breastfeeding at 8 months.
Restaurants are so enjoyable as a couple but the eternal wait for menus then food leads to restless boys and an unhappy baby. I could easily sooth my youngest while my husband did his party tricks to entertain the older boys!
Still, the final result was we left after appetisers, everyone still hungery and I had to make entres when we got home.
My youngest was the only one who got a good meal out and was able to go to bed satisfied when we got home.
I have never had a problem with breastfeeding in public either here in the US or when traveling in Europe or Japan.
Nice too is the fact that I never have to worry about having water or clean bottles or formula feed with me. I am always prepared, no fuss and no more fussy baby.