Call me naive, but I went into my first pregnancy expecting that after having my baby, the extra pounds would more or less fall off on their own. It was a huge wake up call, when a year out, I was still a steady 5 lbs above my pre-baby weight. My son was finally sleeping […]

When you’re pregnant, it’s hard to escape the eat fish, don’t eat fish dilemma. On the one hand, pregnant women are told that fish–rich in iodine, selenium, and omega-3 fatty acids, and other vital nutrients–is good for our babies’ rapidly growing brains. Recent studies have linked fish consumption during pregnancy with faster processing times and […]

As you near the end of your pregnancy (hello, cankles!), you will be screened for Group B Strep, a common and normally harmless bacteria found in between 10-25% of women’s digestive and reproductive tracts. Although mostly benign in adults, Group B Strep (GBS) can cause serious infections in newborns, whose immune systems are still developing. […]

Last month, the measles outbreak in Washington State prompted its governor to declare a state of emergency. Some parents have wised up and finally vaccinated their kids. But others have dug in, even gathering to protest universal vaccine policies. As a researcher who knows how thoroughly the autism-vaccine hypothesis has been debunked*, it’s hard to watch […]

Positive pregnancy test in hand? Wiped out just by getting up from the couch? Mapping out the best places to discretely puke while at the office? Congratulations, and welcome to the first trimester! Assuming you’ve had your first prenatal visit and seen that galloping heartbeat, you’re ready for the next step—testing. So much testing. You’ll […]

Since 2002, The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has recommended that doctors screen all pregnant women for Group B Strep between 35-37 weeks, and that all women who test positive receive IV antibiotics during labor. This policy has more than halved the rate of early onset newborn GBS disease (GBS infection occurring within the first […]

From colostrum to coming to volume… Most expecting moms I know expended a ton of energy preparing for their baby’s arrival. They prepped for labor, studied up on their birth options, and set up their baby’s nursery. But despite all their effort, one major challenge still tended to trip them up after baby arrived: Breastfeeding. […]

When a close friend was trying for a second child in her late 30s, her husband mentioned that all the mothers he saw at the playground seemed old enough to be grandmas. Naturally, she was stung… but not surprised. Her experience is all too familiar. Our society tends to view older-age parenting–well, really older motherhood–as […]

Did you know that you can protect your newborn by receiving a Tdap vaccine during your third trimester? This approach is 90% effective at preventing Whooping Cough in newborns!

My obstetrician used to tell me that if I had been born two hundred years ago, with my ability to maintain a milk supply, I would have been a wet nurse.  But I am not the rule. If anything, I am probably the exception. Many women have trouble maintaining milk supply at some point. And […]

A few years ago, while in that happy but anxious limbo of expecting my first baby, I dutifully read up on labor–its stages, birth plans, and the best ways to “achieve” a natural childbirth. On this last point—achieving a natural childbirth—a theme quickly emerged: My mental state was key. Without the proper level of mindfulness, […]

When it comes to postpartum weight loss, ceding to our body’s message that it desperately needs more rest is not lazy. It is wise. Consider this a pass to take that nap, mama!

When a baby is born, anywhere from 25-60% of the fetal blood supply remains in the placenta. Delaying cord clamping allows this extra blood to pump to baby and has been shown to have long-term mental and physical benefits.

Becoming pregnant after 35 comes with some derogatory labels: geriatric pregnancy, advanced maternal age, older mom (wait, what?!) It’s hard to escape the warnings about your pregnancy being at “high risk” for complications, such as birth defects, high blood pressure, and diabetes just because you passed a certain age bracket. But does your age actually […]

Our modern bodies continue to maintain a nocturnal birth rhythm. But are we messing with the natural rhythm by basking in unnatural light in the middle of labor? Why night-time labor could stall when you reach the hospital and what you can do about it.

Vitamin D—The magical vitamin that our body makes when we bask in the sunshine. In an ideal world, every pregnant woman would soak up vitamin D by relaxing her nine months away somewhere tropical and warm. But if you can’t pass your pregnancy at the beach and, like most of us, only manage to squeeze […]

Still thinking about Zika in 2018? Thanks to that research, we now have good answers for many of the earlier questions on the things to know about Zika and pregnancy.

The Benefits of Amniocentesis and Chorionic Villus Sampling Tara was a young mom-to-be with two healthy young children. Now, pregnant with her third child, she had the usual pregnancy worries: Was her baby growing well? Would she deliver early? Then, at 28 weeks along, an ultrasound revealed her baby’s head circumference was too small. The […]

Many women shy away from amniocentesis and chorionic villi sampling for fear of miscarriage—but this risk of amniocentesis causing miscarriage has been widely overblown and the evidence is outdated.

Prioritizing Sleep as a New Parent Your newborn wakes up for the day at 5 a.m. And it’s brutal. You’ve only managed a couple of hours of uninterrupted sleep (maybe!), and your first thought is how many hours until nap time? You’re not alone. For loads of us, sleep is the central challenge of early […]

Every day we hear more and more about the benefits of exercise in pregnancy for mom and baby. Most doctors recommends an average of 30 minutes of moderate exercise a day. But for some reason, there is still old and out-of-date advice floating around. Let's get to the bottom of this and clear up those myths once and for all.

Non-invasive prenatal testing can revolutionize how we screen for genetic disorders. So why do we restrict the recommendation for it? A look at NIPT vs. first trimester screening.

Roughly 2 out of 3 laboring women in the U.S. will get an epidural. As a highly effective form of pain relief during labor, it’s no wonder that the epidural is enormously popular. But along with the epidural, comes the controversy.  And at the heart of the controversy, the idea that epidurals raise the chances […]

While we have less control over our new baby’s sleep than we would like, we have more control over our own. Plus, the lessons of baby sleep can help us manage our own sleep.

Your baby’s gut microbiome may shape her later health…   Here’s what you can do to give her the best start possible. Ah, the gut microbiome, that teeming collection of fungi, viruses and bacteria that lives inside our intestines. We hear so much about it nowadays, that you could almost believe a healthy gut was […]

Doctors often recommend waiting at least 3 months after a miscarriage. But there’s no compelling evidence that waiting improves your chances of conceiving.

Does weight gain actually follow a neat and tidy curve right up until the end? Probably not!

Why doesn’t anyone believe the research on epidurals and C-sections? As we discussed in our earlier post, Does an epidural lead to a C-section? studies on how epidurals affect the C-section rate present something of a conundrum. Observational studies in the early 1990s originally found a much higher chance of a C-section with an epidural. Since then, […]