Over the last two decades when­ever I meet peo­ple at a gath­er­ing and they ask what I do for a liv­ing, I receive one of four reac­tions when­ever I tell them I am a child­birth educator:

1. They look fright­ened, like I might pull a pla­centa out of a bag, and they quickly decide they need to talk with some­one else.
2. They loved their classes and then ask ques­tions about births they’ve heard about.
3. They tell me the hor­ror sto­ries of their own child­birth classes and want to know how any­one couldn’t know they were pregnant.
4. They tell me they didn’t go to classes because they fig­ured they would learn about it in the hospital.

In response to A: I never carry real pla­cen­tas with me (though if you ask my kids they will tell you that I have pocket mod­els of the pelvis, baby, plactenta and uterus), B: We trade sto­ries, C: I sym­pa­thize. And usu­ally they wish that they’d come to ours!, and D: My jaw is usu­ally on the floor and I am speech­less, a rare thing for me.

So, why go to child­birth classes? (more…)

I was in a good mood, prepar­ing to facil­i­tate Moms’ Group, when into my InBox pops a copy of an essay Erica Jong wrote for the Wall Street Jour­nal about attach­ment par­ent­ing.

Jong is an author who wrote a book in the 70’s called Fear of Fly­ing and is con­sid­ered to be a fem­i­nist voice. Some would say a mil­i­tant fem­i­nist. The last line of the essay reads, “We need to be released from guilt about our chil­dren, not fur­ther bound by it. We need some­one to say: Do the best you can. There are no rules.”  If only Ms. Jong had fol­lowed her own advice. (more…)

Hello there! My name is Erika LaPean and today I’m a guest blog­ger for Colum­bia Cen­ter on baby slings, a.k.a. baby­wear­ing, and all the talk about them. You can find my blog here: Fam­ily Life

I have a daugh­ter, Char­lotte, who is 19-months-old and one due in Feb­ru­ary. It wasn’t until Char­lotte was four weeks old that I bought a Moby Wrap, but I sure could have used it those first four weeks! Thanks to a visit to Colum­bia Center’s Moms’ Group on Wednes­day morn­ings, I met some other moms who had more expe­ri­ence with slings than I did.

I already had a Hot Sling but needed some­thing that would be more ver­sa­tile. One mom had a Moby Wrap and a Maya Wrap. After try­ing out these other slings I bought myself a Moby wrap and put it to use right away. I prob­a­bly would have also bought the Maya Wrap, but see­ing as I already had a Hot Sling, I lim­ited myself to two.

The Moby Wrap imme­di­ately gave me free­dom in my house! I knew it was impor­tant to hold your new­born for the first three months or so, but I also needed to have to free arms for my san­ity. Before, I was always doing house­hold chores and hob­bies with one arm, oth­er­wise Char­lotte would fall out of the Hot Sling when I leaned for­ward. With the Moby wrap, I was able to lean for­ward with­out her falling out! Trust me, baby is so secure in that wrap and it’s really easy to use.

If none of these slings are for you, don’t fret, there are many types on the mar­ket. Colum­bia Cen­ter has an event called Sling Fling where moms are invited to come and test out mul­ti­ple types of slings with their kid­dos. If you can’t make it to an event like this, then call retail stores in the area to see if you can test them out. Stores like P’Sues in Shore­wood and Well-Rounded Mater­nity Cen­ter in Menomonee Falls will both allow you test their slings out. Lastly, the Inter­net is an awe­some resource for moms. Just Google the word “baby sling” and you’ll be amazed at what you can find! YouTube videos are also quite handy if you need to watch other moms demon­strate how to wear the sling you’ve chosen.

Baby slings/carriers don’t lose their use­ful­ness when babies learn to walk. Tod­dlers are heavy and can some­times be clingy. Baby­wear­ing saves par­ents from aching backs and sore arms. Although I don’t use my Moby much with my tod­dler, it does have the option of wear­ing her pig­gy­back which would be help­ful in some situations.

The most impor­tant thing to remem­ber when choos­ing a baby sling is that every­one is dif­fer­ent. Each per­son has unique likes and dis­likes. Don’t give up until you find some­thing that works for you! All babies love to be worn, but it can take some time to find a car­rier that is right for you. If you have ques­tions, please ask! Colum­bia Cen­ter can be a great resource for you.