On My High Horse

Two recommendations have come out this week about children.  The first is that the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) now recommends that parents give their children pacifiers as soon as possible and that, although parents should sleep in the same room as their children, they should not co-sleep.  Both recommendations, they say, will reduce SIDS.  Breastfeeding advocates are very concerned because both of those recommendations are believed to hinder successful long term breastfeeding.  And, in case you’re wondering AAP also recommends breastfeeding for at least 1 year, although the World Health Organization, under less pressure from baby formula companies, recommends at least 2 years. 

<High Horse>

First of all, the latest research on pacifiers and premature babies does not support that pacifiers interfere with successful subsequent breastfeeding.  (I’m having problems googling that article, but I know I saw it after Conor was born)  We don’t know the relationship between early pacifier use, full term babies, and successful breastfeeding, but I would think it can’t be that different.  So, fine.  Use pacifiers.  It should be OK.

The problem I have is with the co-sleeping.  AAP has never supported co-sleeping.  Is this new recommendation a stronger statement based on the same past research OR have they really found that families that co-sleep following all the safe co-sleeping rules (no blankets or comforters, not obese, protection from rolling off bed, by mom only until 6 months old, no toddlers sleeping beside infants and no drugs alcohol) still have problems with SIDS.

I don’t think the new data does show that. And if it does, I want to see it and make my own informed choice.

What bugs me is this fact: 2500 children tragically die of SIDS per year following current guidelines and that is a bad number we want to reduce.  I believe the estimates are that 500,000 children are born each year.  If there is no real relationship between SAFE co-sleeping and SIDS, do we want to jeopardize the successful breastfeeding of potentially 497,500 children because AAP will not strongly promote breastfeeding and start a campaign to teach SAFE co-sleeping?  

And BTW, here’s a link to Dr. Sears site who says that 65 accidental deaths per year occur from co-sleeping.  Sixty-five.  SIDS overwhelmingly happens in the crib.  I cannot find an official response from Dr. James McKenna, a psychologist who studies co-sleeping mothers and infants, beyond “I’m very disappointed.” 

We survived those long nights because we brought Conor to bed with us for his 2:00 feedings.  I don’t know how I would have survived his first 6 months if we had not done that. 

</High Horse>

The second recommendation is not so much a recommendation as a revelation.  You know all those baby books that recommend rice as baby’s first food, keeping food bland, introducing veggies before fruit, delaying meat, and avoiding allergenic food like peanuts for the first year.  BULLSHIT!  There is no scientific support for any of that.  It’s all cultural.  Children can eat just about ANYTHING when they start eating as long as it’s not a choking hazard. 

That really pisses me off.  We were so worried about what and how and when to introduce foods.  And we believe strongly that children in China eat Chinese food, children in India eat Indian food, and children in France eat French food.  That is, there is no universal cry for Wonderbread from children.  They eat they are given.  So, yes, we’ve been introducing Conor to healthy, spice filled foods.  But I would not have worried so much and would have been freer a lot earlier with what we offered him if I had known there is no scientific basis for introducing food to infants.

On a lighter note, I will say I finally figured out why Conor likes black beans so much as I was standing in line at the school cafeteria waiting for my favorite taco salad from when I was pg smothered in black beans and salsa.  Yummmmmm.  And the child can’t get enough spicy Chinese food, again, probably because he’d had a great deal of it in utero from our favorite Chinese restaurant in Charlotte, Dim Sum. 

OK.  So enough preaching my views on sleeping with and feeding children.  It’s Friday and I should think shiny, happy thoughts about the weekend. 

One final observation:  Actually, this is a literal observation we’ve made over the last two weeks.  As predicted (somewhere on this blog in an entry I’m too lazy to find), Conor’s feet are enormous.  Gigantic.  And Wide.  Long, big, and wide feet.  They look normal on his body.  But when comparing his feet to his classmates via the recent footprint art additions on his school wall, we realize the hugeness of his tootsies.  There’s only one other classmate who has bigger feet than Conor, and this boy is over 2 years old.  If Conor grows into his feet, we will be raising a giant.  (Who slept with his parents and ate spicy food before one year old)

OK.  Back to work for me. 

9:28:21 AM